A rise in COVID-19 cases at one of the local schools has forced officials to require masks be worn by students and faculty district-wide until further notice.
Last week, officials with the Grenada School District called for a mask requirement at Grenada Middle School following a surge in cases since school started on Aug. 5. Monday, after the school’s seventh-grade was quarantined, GSD officials announced that masks will be required at all GSD schools.
Superintendent Dr. David Daigneault said that data has been the driving force in this decision, but hopefully the mask requirement will not remain a permanent one. He added that the decision will be re-evaluated over the next couple of weeks and is hopeful that students and staff will be able to return to optional mask-wearing again.
At last Tuesday night’s school board meeting, it was reported that GMS has seven positive COVID-19 cases with 72 close contacts. According to the CDC, a close contact is considered someone that was within six feet of an infected person for 15 minutes.
The news of the cases was enough for District 4 School Board member Marjorie Hughes to make a motion that all schools in the district be required wear masks.
“This should be mandatory in the Grenada School District,” Hughes said. “It’s nobody in the world that hates wearing masks more than me, but I do it. We need to have everyone wearing masks inside our schools.”
District 3 School Board member Arlene Conley said she had spoken with the 100 Black Men of Grenada and other citizens that have expressed concerns over the wearing of masks.
The Board would later use data to drive the decision to only make mask mandatory at GMS. The motion called for mask requirement to be revisited and for Daigneault to make the decision on whether it could be removed.
Hughes motion failed and the later motion, made by District 5 school board member Haley Biddy, passed 4-1. Hughes voted against it.
Data showed COVID-19 numbers at the other schools in the District remain low in single digit cases at Grenada High School, Grenada Elementary School (Pre-K – 3) and Grenada Elementary School (4-5).
“Unfortunately, the increase in cases and the number of quarantined students at our middle school have created an environment where masks will now be required inside the classrooms and school buildings,” GMS Principal Marshall Whittemore said last week.
According to a memo from GMS to parents, masks will not be required outdoors or on school buses.
Whittemore said at Grenada Middle School, the goal is to keep students and teachers safe, while providing a quality education. Unfortunately, Grenada County has seen an increase in COVID-19 cases over the past week. The District’s “Back to School Plan,” initially called for students and staff to have the option to wear a mask or not.
“Please understand that we are making every effort to keep our students in traditional classes and to avoid virtual-learning for students,” the memo reads. “Data has proven that teachers and students have their best educational outcome in a face-to-face learning environment.”
