(Radio Iowa) — A group of Grinnell College alumni has started a petition drive urging administrators to get rid of the school’s nickname for its athletic teams. Grinnell College doesn’t have a mascot, but its athletes are called “Pioneers.” John Aerni-Flessner is a 2001 graduate who was part of Grinnell’s track and field and cross country teams. “As an alumni of the college and a member of the (Grinnell College) athletic Hall of Fame, I got thinking about the name ‘Pioneers’ and realized that this was problematic because of the celebration of westward expansion and the dispossession of Native Americans that took place alongside that,” Aerni-Flessner says. “So I decided to call up a few friends and organize a petition.”

About 750 people have signed the petition since it was posted online a month ago. In addition to alumni, current Grinnell students and faculty have signed onto the petition. “It just came about through the conversations that people have been having around this country,” Aerni-Flessner says, “especially around the protests.” Paragraphs in the petition note Grinnell College has branded itself as a pioneering institution that was at the forefront of abolition and other social justice movements, but it argues the Pioneer nickname can easily be read as demeaning and a celebration of past historical wrongs.

Aerni-Flessner says the petitioners are not suggesting an alternative to Pioneers, but he suggests Grinnell College administrators could launch a democratic process on campus to come up with a new nickname. “That’s something for the college to weigh in on. I don’t live in Grinnell and am not directly connected with the college at the moment and most of the alumni are not as well,” Aerni-Flessner says. “The college can convene a committee, you know, do what they want with that. We’re happy to support those efforts, but we don’t have a proposal for a substitute name.”

Aerni-Flessner co-authored a book about the history of the Midwest Athletic Conference when he was a Grinnell student.