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Judge agrees commonwealth only has room for one Commonwealth school
By adamg on Thu, 11/03/2016 - 11:37am
A federal judge has approveded a lawsuit settlement in which Commonwealth Academy in Springfield will change its name to Springfield Commonwealth Academy and the Commonwealth School in the Back Bay will pay the academy $25,000 to cover the costs of the name change.
The 617 school had sued the 413 school for trademark infringement in federal court in Boston, saying people of means looking for an exclusive prep school might be confused by a similarly named school aimed at low-income kids 90 miles away.
The Springfield school agreed to always use "Springfield" as part of its name from now on. The judge let it keep the commonwealth-academy.org domain name, but only to redirect people to its new domain.
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Comments
If Commonwealth Academy infringed on
the "trademark" (ha-ha) of Commonwealth School, then why does Commonwealth School have to pay the Academy's expenses for changing their name?
Perhaps settlement terms?
Maybe the two schools figured out that $25k and a agreement was cheaper then continuing legal fees.
I think it is an act of
I think it is an act of goodwill by the 617 academy. At the end of the day the Springfield one is a place for low income kids that is most likely a lot more strapped for cash than the 617 academy is.
Yep. This.
To quote from a letter sent to alums when the Globe story broke back in June, "Our only goal through this entire situation has been for the Academy to change its name: we are not trying to harm it in any way. We admire the work the Academy is engaged in, and we continue to hope that we can resolve this situation outside the courtroom so that both of our schools can move forward."
I'm just glad this has been resolved.
regardless of legalities
i don't really like this. commonwealth should be a term that people can use in their businesses if they want without any other sort of specificity.
that, and separately, i can't honestly see a family looking at both the back bay and springfield for schools.
They can...
however, in this case, I can see why the older institution, who has had the name for 60 years or so, would have a problem with the newer school using it. And apparently the judge agreed.
well no actually
the judge ruled they can't, in fact
Get to know the school!!
Please learn about Commonwealth School before lumping it with all "elitist rich kid schools" in your knee-jerk reactions. Commonwealth School was founded with the mission to educate academically motivated kids from all communities and backgrounds regardless of their ability to pay. For such a small school it does an amazing job of raising the money to give financial aid to 30% of the students. In the old days, Mr. Merrill (the founder) paid for the scholarships himself, and now one of the school's top priorities is expanding our financial aid program. Kids commute from as far away as Ipswich, Worcester and Providence, and yes, there has been confusion between the two schools already--not which they are, but over the name. Believe me, there's much more to the story than that biased, inflammatory and poorly researched article in the Globe reported. Both schools involved are doing amazing work, and there really doesn't have to be a "bad guy" in this situation, however fun it is to bash the stereotype.
actually
they sound like the bad guy and you sound like their crony