By Staff Reporter |

Chandler Unified School District (CUSD) narrowly approved a land acknowledgment statement for Native Americans during its regular meeting last week.

The board approved the land acknowledgment statement 3-2. The governing board will read a land acknowledgment statement at every meeting and at all graduation ceremony programs. 

Board President Patti Serrano, donned in a pro-Palestine keffiyeh scarf and MEChA t-shirt, joined Member Claudia Mendoza and Vice President Barb Mozden in voting to require the land acknowledgment statement. Members Kurt Rohrs and Ryan Heap voted against the measure.

Serrano said this land acknowledgement statement was necessary to make Native American students feel “safe” to show up and learn at CUSD schools. 

Serrano also claimed that a land acknowledgment statement did not mean that the district would be required to accept requests for acknowledgments for other identity groups. 

CUSD has posted a land acknowledgment statement and accompanying video on its Indigenous Education Program page since 2025.

That land acknowledgment statement reads that the district exists on lands previously occupied by the Piipaash, Akimel O’odham, Gila River, Salt River, Pima, Maricopa, and Yaqui tribes. 

Board member Rohrs questioned whether there would be future efforts to expand the requirement to read a land acknowledgment statement throughout other aspects of district activities, such as student functions like football games, CUSD staff meetings, and the beginning of classes. 

Rohrs also said that land acknowledgement statements signaled bias and favoritism toward certain groups. He warned that the board’s approval would lead to demands by countless other identity groups: Holocaust recognition for Jewish students, acknowledgments for the various religious groups, or commemorations of veterans for students in military families. 

Rohrs contended that the statement was rooted in “identity politics” that would further cause division in the CUSD community. 

“Despite denials, this is clearly a political statement that reveals a preferential and exclusive bias towards a certain point of view of a certain identity group. The district must remain neutral in these matters,” said Rohrs. “For practical matters, this unnecessarily politicizes our board meetings. It has no real purpose in addressing our primary mission of improving academic performance for our students. This statement is an empty performance gesture of wokeness which really doesn’t accomplish anything and distracts from our core mission.” 

Board member Heap remarked that the district faces much more pressing matters concerning student outcomes, citing an example of two more students who left the district for homeschooling due to the district ignoring or dismissing requests to curtail teacher and student usage of vulgar language. Heap also remarked that reading scores have declined to the lower 50th percentile. 

Heap expressed doubt that the lack of a land acknowledgment statement was having negative impacts on the district, especially the current pressing issues of declining enrollment. According to the board, less than 2% of students will be directly impacted by the land acknowledgement statement.

Heap questioned why there were acknowledgments for certain identity groups but not others, which prompted laughter from the pro-land acknowledgment statement audience in attendance. 

“Any time when we choose to highlight a group of students only based on their identity, nationality, heritage, we indirectly eschew — that means, you ignore — other people. We have a Hispanic heritage month. Do we have an Irish month? Do we have an Anglo-Saxon month?” asked Heap. “I don’t think that it’s appropriate for us to engage in that activity, either, because we are now wandering in areas that even if it’s right or wrong, I believe this statement ends up [having] a political connotation. Anytime you do that, you show bias, and that’s going to end up driving away students.”

Mendoza said that the statement was necessary for respecting diversity and belonging.

“By doing this, we are demonstrating that every story matters and every voice has value,” said Mendoza. 

Mozden predicted the statement would improve Native American students’ academic performance. 

“We have to start somewhere to try to raise our academic performance for some of our subgroups,” said Mozden. 

The land acknowledgment incited some community members to call on Serrano to step down from the board, since Serrano led on the effort of its adoption. 

Serrano has been accused of imposing a land acknowledgment without board concurrence at board meetings and graduation ceremonies.

Serrano has historically declined to participate in recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance, and took her oath of office on a fiction book written by Arizona State University professor David Boyle describing the gay sexual fantasies of a boy and his peers and the boy’s rejection of the values held by his conservative, Christian parents.

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