We recognize that The Berkeley School sits on the territory of Huichin, the ancestral and unceded land of the Chochenyo-speaking Ohlone people, the successors of the historic and sovereign Verona Band of Alameda County.
From the US Department of Arts and Culture, a non-governmental grassroots organization: “We recognize that for more than five hundred years, Native communities across the Americas have demonstrated resilience and resistance in the face of violent efforts to separate them from their land, culture, and each other. They remain at the forefront of movements to protect Mother Earth and the life the earth sustains. Today, corporate greed and federal policy push agendas to extract wealth from the earth, degrading sacred land in blatant disregard of treaty rights. Land acknowledgement is a critical public intervention, a necessary step, toward honoring Native communities and enacting the much larger project of decolonization and reconciliation.”
In 2019, as a part of their study of the Ohlone People, 3rd graders visited the Oakland Museum and heard from indigenous rights activist Corrina Gould about the campaign to protect local Ohlone shellmounds. With the help of their 7th grade buddies, 3rd graders wrote letters to Berkeley Mayor Arreguin to express their support of the city’s recent decision to reject a housing construction proposal on the West Berkeley shellmound and urge him to guarantee protection of all sacred Ohlone sites.
Visit Shellmound.org to learn more about actions you can take to protect Ohlone land. Acknowledgment does not stand in for relationship and action. If you live on Ohlone Land, we invite you to learn more about the voluntary shuumi land tax via the Sogorea Te Land Trust.
