USD 336 board modifies policy on face masks

On a vote of 6-1 here Monday night at the high school library, the Holton school board voted to return to a school policy making mask wearing optional inside all school buildings for all pre-K through 12th grade students and all staff and to also make provisions for those in close contact of a positive test case to remain in school by wearing face masks for specified lengths of time. 

About 75 local people were on hand for the meeting. Both sides of the mask-wearing issue were represented and their spokespersons were given opportunities to address the board.

Close contact will continue to be defined at the schools as less than six feet in a low risk environment for 10 consecutive minutes when masks are not worn by both contacts and as less than six feet in a high risk environment for 10 consecutive minutes. Mask use during high risk activities does not apply.

Any student or staff testing positive for COVID-19 will still stay home from school for 10 days from the onset of symptoms and can return on the 11th day if fever-free for 72 hours prior. Those with no symptoms must stay home from school for 10 days from the day of the positive test and can return to school on the 11th day if fever-free for 72 hours prior.

Those students and staff deemed to have been in close contact with a positive test case can still attend in-person classes, if they wear face masks for the 10-day restriction period from last contact with a positive case. Masks are again optional on day 11. Close contacts can also test on day six with a PCR (polymerase chain reacton) test from a health provider and be cleared on day eight with a negative test. During the 10-day restriction period, close contacts will observe a modified lunch format.

Unvaccinated close contacts are not allowed to actively participate in extracurricular activities during the close contact restriction period.

Vaccinated close contacts, however, may continue to participate in extracurricular activities and are not required to observe the close contact restriction period.

Face masks continue to be required on all school buses and other district transportation. Unvaccinated close contacts are ineligible for all district transportation during the close contact restriction period, so parents are responsible to transport unvaccinated close contacts to and from school during that time.

Board members Shelby Patch, Mike Ford, Rex Frazier, Dena Swisher, Allen Arnold and Brittany DeBarge voted in favor of returning to the policy of optional mask wearing in the schools. Board member Christina Murphy voted against it.

Some school officials said they and their fellow board members and administrators have been receiving numerous emails and phone calls from local people expressing opinions for and against mask wearing in schools ever since the board re-instated mandatory mask wearing at the last school board meeting.

The district started the new school term with optional mask wearing but the board mandated mask wearing in schools soon after classes started due to positive COVID test cases in the schools. The school operational guidelines in place also caused many close contact students and staff to stay home and quarantine.

Since then, school officials said, health care professionals in the community on both sides of the mask wearing issue have expressed the merits of their views in persuasive manners.

For more on this story, please log in to your holtonrecorder.net account and select the Sept. 15, 2021 edition under “E-Editions.”