Students share their thoughts on having a new Minnesota state flag

Sydney Zatz KAALTV

Students share their thoughts on a new state flag

For the last few months, we've been sharing Minnesota's progress on the search for a new state flag. We've talked about the numbers and heard from the state, but what about the younger generation? Like most Minnesotans, kids have mixed feelings about the flag and the big change. ABC 6 News Good Morning Reporter Sydney Zatz spoke with students at Pacelli Catholic Schools in Austin to hear their thoughts.

(ABC 6 News) – For the last few months, we’ve been sharing Minnesota’s progress on the search for a new state flag. We’ve talked about the numbers and heard from the state, but what about the younger generation? Like most Minnesotans, kids have mixed feelings about the flag and the big change. ABC 6 News Good Morning Reporter Sydney Zatz spoke with students at Pacelli Catholic Schools in Austin to hear their thoughts.

Like many of us, since these kids were born, they’ve known the Minnesota state flag. Students, happily pointing out every detail on the flag and what it means when ABC 6 News stopped by.

Francesca Visanti, a sixth-grader at Pacelli pointed out the state flowers and the meaning of L’Étoile du Nord, the star of the north. Meanwhile, Emilia Churchill, a fifth-grader pointed out how the water represents 10,000 lakes.

“I had the luxury of showing my eighth graders, I just asked, ‘Have any of you heard of the new flag?’ And they all go ‘No.’ And so I pulled up the top three finalists and in unison they all go, ‘Eww. What!?'” Nick McGrath, a former Social Studies Teacher at Pacelli shared.

Now, there are some who say it’s time for change like fifth-grader Lilian Ramirez.

“Most flags in the U.S. have something that like a toddler can draw. This, I think it might take a while for a toddler to draw this.”

“Change is natural,” said Andrew Frederick who is a senior. “It’s natural to change so you need at some point, to change something. It can’t always be the same old, same old.”

“It’s such a toss-up because the other ones are really good. But this one has a lot of meaning,” added Regan Brooks, another fifth-grader.

While the new flag design has been chosen, most students say they preferred the one in the middle, over the other two finalists.

“I think a lot of people are going for artwork or symbolism that is a little more minimalist or a little more simplified. So I get it, it’s a flag of 2023. But I think it’s lacking that storytelling piece that our current flag opens itself to. Flawed or not, there’s an opportunity for storytelling there,” added McGrath.

Right now, there is no clear costs on the new flag. The State Emblem Redesign Commission was given $35,000 from the state legislature last session. Money, students say would be better put elsewhere.

“There’s definitely bigger issues in our state that we could probably cover with the money,” said Grayson Bickler, a tenth-grader at Pacelli.

“I see why we should change it because there’s been a lot of backlash on the flags, and different sports teams having different logos than their teams. But there’s definitely other things we could be spending our money on.”

Churchill suggests the money could go to the poor, or to help an orphanage,

When asked how these students would design the flag, a lot of them mentioned keeping with the blue, green, and white color scheme. They also said they would have a Loon or the outline of Minnesota somewhere on the flag.