Reply to Charters: When is yours dropping the outdoor mask mandate?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Our charter is dropping it this coming week thank goodness.[/quote]

Would you mind sharing which one? Is this outside only or also inside optional? I am guessing you don't have a health check or 10 day quarantine.[/quote]

MV, no outdoor mask starting this week.  No health check.  Vaccinated asymptomatic kids do not have to quarantine.  We have a very high vax rate, high 70%, so basically only kids not vax are ECE kids.  Positive Covid cases 7 day quarantine.

They also said they are reviewing new changes with mask optional now and will let us know in a week or so about that.  Hopefully indoor will be dropped too.

IMO they have done a really good job with school wide testing , protocols, and keeping classes open during the Omicron surge.  They are very transparent about number of cases at the school and the data is sent out in the weekly bulletin to families. Cases at our school have been low.  I think this helps with decision making hopefully in lifting indoor masks.

DC has left the masking decision to schools. [b] If your school doesn’t know their vax rate and case rate and don’t have the data, then I’m not sure how the principal or leadership can make these decisions on a school by school basis.[/b]

I’m all for following CDC guidelines but it doesn’t sound like OSSE is mandating lifting indoor masking so it sounds like it will be up to individula schools.[/quote]

They could just follow CDC guidance, which is actually the right thing to do.  School principals aren't public health authorities and shouldn't be making public health decisions.  Listen to experts, amirite?[/quote]

Yeah. I get that during early COVID, we were all running around trying to figure out what was the right thing to do because the situation was so complicated and what we were hearing wasn't necessarily complete or reliable. I was reading studies and trying to make decisions on the basis of that, and I'm sure that school leadership felt like they had to make these kinds of decisions for their communities as well. But we're so past that now. All you have to do is do the thing that public health guidance is telling you to do and that practically everyone else is already doing. [/quote]

I agree but the majority of DCPS schools have very low vax rate if the total vax percentage in DC for kids is in the 20’s.  So these families likely want all kids to be masked.  The school vax rate does not correlate with community vax rates and why it’s important to know what the vax rate is in your school. Just like how the CDC base their recommendations on vax rate.[/quote]

We have no idea what "these families likely want."  Furthermore, these families aren't public health authorities either.

I was keen on tying the vaccination rates to masking for a while there, too, but given that 1) we don't have a strong signal that vaccination does a lot for transmission reduction for the 5-11 year olds, 2) cases really aren't that meaningful any more, 3) there are low rates of severe illness for kids anyway (with or without vax), I've begun thinking that vaccination isn't that important *in making decisions about schools*.  Yes, vaccination is very important for older people in preventing them from severe illness and death.  I just think it's not that important regarding kids (new variants may change that).[/quote]

You live in a bubble PP.  The kids don’t live by themselves, they go home to parents who likely have lots of co-morbidities and grandparents who live with them[b] who may not be vax.[/b][/quote]

The overwhelming DCUM sentiment has long been Eff those MAGA Idiots who refuse to get vaccinated. Why is it now different, especially when it is so easy to get vaccinated and has been since last June?

[/quote]

Exactly. Also, if the parents at those low vaccination schools want to keep masking their kids, they are free to do so. Or they could do something that's actually effective in protecting their kids and them from Covid, which is to get vaccinated. But no way should kids at other schools be forced to keep masking to protect unvaccinated people elsewhere.[/quote]

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