Highlands school board votes to make masks optional

Highlands students are not required to wear masks in class, or elsewhere on district property, after the school board on Wednesday night reversed a previous mandate.

The policy extends to staff and visitors, though the new mask-optional guidelines will limit outsiders in the building.

The board voted 6-3, with members Bobbie Neese, Gene Witt, Ashley Javier, Nicole Kocon, Judy Wisner and Kelli Canonge in favor.

Members Deb Lehew, Kristie Babinsack and Laura Butler voted to keep a full-time mask requirement.

“I believe the board made the best decision last evening,” Wisner said. “Parents should be the only ones making decisions concerning their children.”

Masks still are required on buses.

Board members said the district’s health and safety plan can be revisited and revised as data changes.

Babinsack fears it will be too late. Without masks, she believes it is only a matter of time before Highlands is shut down and returns to virtual learning.

“Our paid physician has advised us to remain masked,” Babinsack said. “Our covid numbers are the highest they have been throughout the pandemic. There are many surrounding districts that went to optional masking only to then have to shut down either due to covid outbreak or staffing shortages.”

Babinsack also doesn’t agree with the new CDC quarantine guidelines where students can return to class unmasked in five days.

“They can sit there beside another student who may or may not be masked and may or may not be vaccinated,” she said. “I have had covid and I can tell you that it is not gone within five days, even if you are vaccinated when you get it. I feel like you are returning students to school with a virus only to pass it along to others.

“We do not have enough subs to cover regular absences let alone a covid outbreak for multiple teachers or staff at one time.”

The district’s new quarantine policy is as follows: People who test positive for covid will quarantine for five days; close contacts who are asymptomatic do not have to quarantine regardless of vaccination status. Close contacts who are symptomatic will quarantine for five days.

Students, staff and visitors who contract covid within 90 days of their last positive test do not have to quarantine regardless of vaccination status.

Highlands is reporting 18 confirmed covid cases this week, with the high school and middle school reporting seven each and the elementary school reporting four. That follows 42 cases the week of Jan. 10.

The Pennsylvania Department of Health in August ordered mandatory masking for all schools in the state. In December, the state Supreme Court struck down the order, returning the policy decision to school districts.

Masking has remained a heated debate in schools across the region.

Just this week, Allegheny Valley School District voted to keep masks in place for its students and staff.

A federal judge on Monday issued a temporary restraining order sought by pro-mask parents in North Allegheny School District, resuming mandatory masking for all.

Last week, Fox Chapel Area School Board voted to make masks optional for everyone inside district buildings so long as there are five consecutive days of low to moderate covid case levels.

In December, covid-19 hospitalizations among young children jumped to the highest level since the start of the pandemic, increasing more than 14-fold from mid-December to the end of the month, according to data collected by the Allegheny County Health Department.

Highlands Superintendent Monique Mawhinney said previously that if masking became optional, district officials would have to “do their best” to keep moving forward in terms of allowing small-group instruction, holiday parties and other close interactions.

On Wednesday, the board said that to the maximum extent possible, physical distance will be maintained in classroom settings and other areas of the schools.

If feasible, some physical distancing will be maintained on school buses, where masks remain a requirement per federal rules requiring universal masking on public transportation.

Limited access to district facilities will be available to volunteers and nonessential personnel to prevent unnecessary exposure, according to the newly approved plan. How that will affect elementary parties moving forward was not immediately clear, though many people questioned the school board last week on the matter.

School board President Bobbie Neese said the continuous debate on masking has been difficult for school boards “as it is truly an impossible decision.”

“No matter the direction the board moves, you know it is going to upset people and that weighs heavily on board directors,” she said.