When Monte the Matador “returned” to Monta Vista at the Welcome Back Rally after a “long vacation,” almost everyone was surprised. However, Monte had long been in the making.

“Everything was related to the bull, and we’re not the bulls,” Principal April Scott said. “We’ve tried very hard to say we’re Matadors, and if we’re Matadors the Matadors need to be on our letterhead, the Matadors need to be on our jerseys, the Matadors need to be everywhere. And if it was going to be anywhere, it needed to be with the mascot.”

So last year, Scott and Dean of Students Mike White began working on the new mascot together.

“White contacted a company that makes the suits for mascots, and they gave us a rough draft of what they thought it would look like and…we tweaked it,” Scott said. “We decided where the purple and gold were going to be, where the black was going to be. Did we want a red cape? How big we wanted his hat, those kinds of things. And they just customized it for us.”

Monte arrived over the summer. According to FUHSD Student Representative, Hadar Sachs, the Administration and Leadership wanted to wait until the first rally to present him to the student body.

“The new matador exemplifies who we are as [the MVHS] Matadors,” Sachs said. “[Monte’s] a true testament to the [MVHS] nature.”

Sophomore Christian Choy is also excited about the new addition.

“I’ve always been a big fan of El Toro, but now I think a lot of people will be a fan of Monte as well,” Choy said. “Our school’s lucky enough to have two mascots: both a bull and a matador. So I think Leadership is going to definitely put together some clever skits between those two at events.”

It will be interesting to see how having two mascots plays out. Monte and El Toro are scheduled to appear at sports events, school rallies, and other school-related activities.

“[At the football game, El Toro and Monte] will be holding two ends of the ribbon and Cathy Ang is going to cut the ribbon,” Sachs said on Friday before the game.