A universal mask requirement will be in place when Hopkinton students return to school later this month, the School Board decided Tuesday, saying the extra mitigation strategy will help the district achieve its goal of 180 days of in-person learning.
Board members agreed to adopt a reopening plan for fall that includes in-person learning five days a week, masks for everyone indoors and three-feet distancing.
“Everything that’s discussed tonight is the goal to have kids in school and that’s the priority,” said Hopkinton’s new superintendent, Michael Flynn, who started work in July. “Because we know mental health, social health, physical health, gaps and growth, everything is better when they are in the brick and mortar of our walls.”
Flynn confirmed in an email to the school community Thursday that the district will be moving ahead with the plan, after waiting to hear Wednesday’s updated recommendations from New Hampshire DHHS. The state is now recommending schools implement mask policies when schools or their surrounding counties reach “substantial” levels of COVID transmission. As of Friday, all of New Hampshire has a “substantial” community transmission designation, due to the highly contagious Delta variant spreading rampantly through New England.
According to Hopkinton’s reopening framework, dubbed the “safe learning plan,” families are being asked to assess their children’s health before school, and to contact the school if they have any symptoms. The district is going to move away from sending students home if they have only one symptom, and instead send students home when they display viral or respiratory viral symptoms.
The district will keep track of positive cases within the schools on its own summary dashboard that administrators will update with the current numbers of cases in the schools as well as the risk level for Merrimack County according to DHHS. The nurse’s office has rapid COVID-19 test kits that can be used, with parent permission, to test kids with symptoms, to cut down on children having to be sent home.
Board members Norm Goupil, Dulcie Madden Lipoma and Rob Nadeau advocated for a universal mask mandate, citing rising rates of COVID cases, paired with the fact that children under 12 aren’t yet eligible for vaccines, and a desire to keep learning in-person.
“I believe right now we should require masks in our schools, because we don’t know what’s going to happen moving forward,” Goupil said. “I don’t want our school, our community, to be a statistic on that chart where we are having to look at that, saying ‘the choice I made here at this table led to that.’”
Board members Andrea Folsom and Jim O’Brien spoke in favor of a modified mask policy, where masks would be optional for employees and middle and high school students, who have all had the opportunity to be vaccinated, while still requiring masks for elementary school students who are not yet eligible for the vaccine.
“To start off the school year with the messages we’ve given our teens in asking them to get the vaccine and the messages we’ve given our teachers in asking them to get the vaccine, with the numbers as they stand now, I would be comfortable going forward with the modified mask requirement,” Folsom said.
During the public comment section, eight community members spoke in favor of requiring masks in schools, and 11 spoke against it, before the board ultimately agreed to move forward with the universal mask mandate.
“It is powerful when parents and families and moms and dads speak, because all you’re doing is advocating for your household and your values and your core values, that is all great,” Flynn said. “It is my job as superintendent to make sure that we are providing a safe environment for our staff and our students and that we are going to attend school for 180 days a year.”
The nearby Concord School District is requiring masks indoors until either the city of Concord’s vaccination rate reaches 70% (the minimum to achieve herd immunity), or until the COVID-19 vaccine is approved for children under 12 and a sufficient period of time has passed to allow families to vaccinate their children. Merrimack Valley School Board voted Monday to follow the recommendations of DHHS regarding masks.
In other parts of the state, Nashua, Somersworth, Oyster River have decided to reopen with universal mask requirements. Dover has mandated masks for elementary and middle school students only. In Keene and Newfound, masks will be optional for now.