When students in Old Rochester Regional District schools return from their vacation week on Monday, February 28, they will only be required to wear a facemask in two locations: on the bus and in school offices.
On the athletic fields, the campus at large, the parking lots and, yes, even in the classrooms, cafeteria and gymnasium, masks will no longer be required after the Joint School Committee/Superintendency Union #55 achieved agreement at the end of a three-hour, emergency public meeting on Tuesday night.
A union-side vote saw Robin Rounseville as the sole dissenting vote against the February 28 lifting of the mandate. Nichole Daniel, April Nye, Tiffini Reedy, Karin Barrows, Anne Fernandes, Carly Lavin and Chairperson Sharon Hartley all voted in the affirmative.
The district side provided most of the opposition, as Suzanne Tseki and Joe Pires were alone in their approval the first time the vote was taken. Michelle Smith, Jim Muse, Jason Chisholm, Margaret McSweeny, Mark Monteiro, Frances Kearns and Chairperson Heather Burke all rejected the motion as presented.
Lengthy discussion ensued including procedural matters, but the motion never changed so it was with a renewed sense of options going forward that a second vote saw Burke and Smith hold back their approval.
A painstaking debate and vote was not only protracted by passionate disagreement as to the timing of the state’s lifting of the mask mandate following a vacation week, but the process was wrought with confusion.
The JSC has taken many a vote since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, but none had caused so much pause as this one. Until Superintendent of Schools Mike Nelson, given the floor by the respective chairpersons, urged the sides to find common ground, there was a realistic chance that the union side would rescind the preexisting masking policy as permitted by the state and that the region side would not.
Attempts to amend the existing policy to be rescinded at a later date such as March 14, presumably for the purposes of bearing out a lack of spike in positive cases coming back from the traditional, week-long winter vacation were abandoned for the sake of progress.
The other concern shared by several hesitant members was ensuring that a mechanism is in place should there be a spike in cases, be it immediately out of the February vacation or at any time in the future.
As of Tuesday night, the ORR School District is without a masking policy beyond February 28.
Nelson made sure to emphasize an ongoing diligence on his part to continue absorbing and posting data, meeting with local health officials on a regular basis and being on the ready should the trend reverse.
While Nye, Reedy, Barrows and Pires were among those committee members arguing that the data supplied by the state all through the pandemic has been followed so why ignore it now that the data suggests it is time to stop requiring facemasks, other members such as Burke and Jim Muse insisted there is more to the decision.
Beyond concerns over the timing juxtaposed on the heels of a school vacation week, Burke said that families that might reconsider vaccinations have no time to respond to the lifting of the mandate while Muse said the only data point offered by the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education had been an 80-percent vaccination rate that ORR Schools do not have.
Nelson offered the committee a breakdown of vaccination rates among staff and students in ORR Schools. When pooled together, the building vaccination rates are as follows: Center School 40 percent, Old Hammondtown 62 percent, Rochester Memorial 40 percent, Sippican 47 percent, ORR Junior High 64 percent and the high school at 75 percent.
Covid-19 positives at district schools are at an all-time low with only four active cases, including two at the junior high and one each at RMS and the high school.
ORR Director of Student Services Craig Davidson shared the results of a survey indicating that the overwhelming majority of the parents/guardians of students in all six district schools wished for the mandate to be lifted. Staff preferences were closer to a balance, but the majority in all six schools was in favor of lifting the mandate.
Nearly every member of the public who sought to speak in the open-forum portion of the meeting said it is time to take the masks off. Some went beyond that, referencing expert opinions and personal observations that masking especially on small children is actually detrimental toward their health.
Others focused on the masks themselves and insist that only the N95 mask functions as intended, and that model is largely unavailable in the schools.
On the other side of the ledger, there were those who hoped that ORR would delay the lifting of the mandate closer to when children will be spending the majority of their playtime outdoors.
Once the union and region sides finally agreed with the region’s vote to rescind the policy at 9:55 pm, Muse said, “The policy requires a lot of care, and I’m sure that the superintendent will continue to advise us …” He noted ongoing attention to case counts and Nelson’s Covid-19 dashboard. “If there is an uptick, we should consider calling a special meeting if necessary to propose a policy change. Hopefully we don’t have to because of the fears that I have or anyone else has wouldn’t come to fruition.”
Before adjournment, Nelson strove to maintain the committee’s confidence in his due diligence. “To me, this was not about to mask or not to mask but being flexible for others’ decisions,” he said. “I will not hesitate to call on this school committee if I have any doubt.”
The next meeting of the Joint School Committee is scheduled for Thursday, April 28, at 6:30 pm.
Joint School Committee/Superintendency Union #55
By Mick Colageo