After around a week of not having a mask mandate, the Turner school district changed to a mask mandate effective today.
The main issue with masking, according to spokeswoman Lauren Aiello, is that they have to quarantine unvaccinated, unmasked students who were close contacts of positive cases.
“We want students in school and quarantines keep that from happening,” she stated.
The school district reported 23 active student positive cases and four active staff positive cases on Wednesday morning, she stated.
Unvaccinated, unmasked persons who came into close contact with the positive cases were given three quarantine options, she stated. The three options were that unvaccinated, unmasked close contacts could quarantine for 10 days; unvaccinated, unmasked close contacts could quarantine for seven days and return to school with a negative COVID-19 test after seven days; or in lieu of a quarantine, unvaccinated, unmasked close contacts could remain in school by wearing a mask and taking a daily rapid COVID-19 test for seven days, she stated. All tests would be administered in school buildings without cost to those who are tested.
“Our stance is that we want all students in school and so we want to prevent any and all quarantines – even one student quarantine is too many,” Aiello stated. “By having all individuals masked inside our buildings, we will be able to significantly reduce the need to implement quarantines, which will result in fewer interruptions to academics, activities, athletics, and other services.”
Most Turner students chose to wear masks, and at the secondary levels, there are students who have been vaccinated, so not all the students who were in close contacted needed to be quarantined, just those who were unmasked or unvaccinated, she said.
Many students who were close contacts chose the option to remain in school and take a daily rapid test, she stated.
“While we are glad that those students chose to continue coming to school with additional mitigation procedures in place, the need to do rapid testing on those students each day is taxing on our nurses, who have other non-COVID medical needs to attend to, and so by all students being masked, we will be able to limit the need to do the quarantines and rapid testing,” Aiello stated.
In the future, the requirement of all persons wearing masks will significantly reduce the need to quarantine, Aiello stated. If a student is wearing a mask and was a close contact, the student will not have to quarantine, she added.
“That being said, our nurses will be diligent about contact tracing and we may need to give those three quarantine options to families if we find, for example, that students were sitting next to a positive case while unmasked at lunch,” she stated. “The safety of our students and staff is our top priority.”
The Turner school district sent a message to parents about the COVID-19 mitigation update. The message:
“As we have previously stated, our priority for this school year is to keep our schools open and provide a safe, in-person learning environment for our students and staff. We are grateful to our many families who chose to send their students to school wearing a mask; however, being just six days into the school year, we are experiencing positive cases in our buildings, and as a result, there is already a significant amount of quarantines of unvaccinated, unmasked individuals.
“We believe that in-person learning in our schools is what is best for our students. The need to quarantine unvaccinated, unmasked individuals is not sustainable for our staff and is taking too many students out of our classrooms. Because of this, we will be requiring masks in indoor spaces starting this Thursday, August 19th. This change will significantly reduce the need to implement quarantines, which will result in fewer interruptions in academics, activities, athletics, and other services. Masks will continue to be required on school buses due to the federal order.
“Regardless of individual views on masking, we believe our families want their children to be in school, and this change will better our ability to keep classrooms and schools open.
“Thank you for your understanding.
“Turner Unified School District”
