NW Democrat-Gazette

A covid-19 gamble

Springdale places its bet, drops masks

The Springdale School Board’s decision last week to let its mask mandate for students in kindergarten through seventh grades lapse wasn’t an easy one.

On public bodies like school boards, everything comes down to a final vote. Those votes make decisions appear as though they’re clearcut, without-a-doubt resolutions of whatever issue is on the table.

But anyone observing Springdale’s discussion of whether to let the school district’s masking mandate lapse could attest to the presence of doubt. Board members wrestled openly with the information at hand.

Most people addressing the board reflected more certainty that the mask mandate ought to be removed. It’s government overreach, some said. Another said forcing kids to wear masks was a form a child abuse, that if God wanted children to wear masks, God would have created them with masks. Another worried masks reduced oxygen intake, suggesting that hurt kids’ brain power. Still another said masks are a medical decision to be made by parents, not the government.

For the record, we (and the medical experts) remain convinced vaccines are the best path to protecting people from covid-19 infections. We (and the medical experts) remain convinced properly worn masks decrease transmission of the disease between people. None of them are guaranteed. Applied together or even separately, they still offer more protection than pretending there’s no pandemic happening at all.

While we might have voted differently on the mandate, here’s one aspect we can appreciate: The Springdale School Board looked at the data from the experience within the district’s classrooms so far this year. That information, as presented by district administrators, did not provide convincing evidence that masks were significantly altering the district’s covid-19 experience.

Look around at other school districts — with and without mask mandates — and there are some pretty compelling cases for the power of masks to prevent the spread of covid-19. But in Springdale schools so far, one might say they’re beating the spread on beating the spread.

School board members in many instances described personal differences with mask mandates. They acknowledged, however, that state rules requiring staff or students to quarantine after a “probable close contact” made a decision on masks hard. The quarantine rules, school administrators said, send home a lot of kids who never end up getting covid-19.

For example, in the 2020-21 school year, 6,332 close contacts meeting quarantine requirements were reported in the school district. Out of those, 104 tested positive for covid-19. That’s 1.6 percent. And educators know from the covid experience that kids at home don’t learn as well as kids in the classroom.

“As an education leader, I see this statistic as 6,228 individuals who were unnecessarily away from either school or work impacting teaching and learning in our district,” Superintendent Jared Cleveland said.

Cleveland has encouraged Gov. Asa Hutchinson and public health officials to reconsider the quarantining rules, which he said requires the “overquarantining” of staff and students. The rules allow exposed people to stay in school if they’re fully vaccinated or if both the infected and exposed person were wearing masks.

Cleveland has suggested easing up a bit by allowing an exposed person who was wearing a mask at the time of possible exposure to stay in school even if the infected person wasn’t wearing one.

Reasonable people can disagree on the board’s final decision, but we appreciate that at no point did the school board members devolve into some sort of partisan political discussion. The fundamental objective remained how to safely keep as many students and educators as possible in the classroom and changing state rules that, at least from Springdale’s experience, too radically send people home.

On a motion by board member Kevin Ownbey, the board ended up voting 4-1, with two abstentions, to let the mask mandate lapse. Even those who supported the measure said the board could call a meeting within 48 hours at any point new data shows the decision had a harmful effect.

Are they experimenting with their students, faculty and staff? To a degree, yes. Throughout the pandemic, though, the response has continued to involve a healthy, so to speak, dose of trial and error.

Last week, the Springdale School decided to leave it in the hands of parents, students and teachers to decide for themselves. School board member Debbie Creek reminded everyone of a critical point: With choice comes consequences. In other words, even with no mask mandate in effect, everyone needs to remember that wearing a mask will, under quarantining requirements, significantly reduce one’s chance of being sent home.

With the more aggressive Delta variant circulating, let’s hope no student or teacher infected becomes seriously ill or, heaven forbid, worse. Is that a gamble? Yes, it is. The school board just told parents, students, staff and teachers it’s a game of chance, but it’s their dice to roll.

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2021-09-19T07:00:00.0000000Z

2021-09-19T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://edition.nwaonline.com/article/284159339144347

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