Wichita schools to require masks starting next week; 194 students are COVID positive
Wichita Public Schools will require masks indoors starting next week for everyone 3 years old and older as district data shows more than 3% of students are in quarantine less than two weeks into the school year.
The Wichita Board of Education voted unanimously to approve the measure Monday night after Superintendent Alicia Thompson told board members that 1,612 students, or 3.4%, were in quarantine because of close contact with COVID-19.
The mask mandate will go into effect Monday, Aug. 30.
The school board’s 6-0 decision came two weeks after voting to “strongly recommend” masking in schools. Board member Mia Turner was not in attendance.
“I listen to my heart, and my heart tells me, even if we can keep one child from getting the disease, it’s important for us to do that,” board member Sheril Logan said.
Thompson said 194 students and 51 staff members are currently positive for the virus, according to district data.
“I do wish that we had an option for remote learning, but we don’t,” board member Ernestine Krehbiel said.
The district’s MySchool Remote program implemented last school year is not available to students this year, per a decision by the Kansas State Department of Education and the Kansas Legislature to limit the amount of time students spend learning remotely.
Krehbiel said she has changed her thinking on requiring masks since the vote two weeks ago.
“We require kids to wear shoes to school. We require families to put children in seat belts in the back seat,” she said. “I think that Wichita schools need to be a model for the state of saying that we want to be proactive to stop the next generation from having any of the long COVID impact and from us having to have it happen in our schools.”
Wichita, the largest school district in the state, now joins several other large Kansas school districts that have required masks since the start of the school year, including Topeka and school districts in the Johnson County area.
Brent Lewis, president of United Teachers of Wichita said school nurses are currently doing “double duty” to stay on top of daily testing for students who may have been exposed to the virus.
“Our nurses have told us that the source of this problem is unmasked students or staff that create a high-risk contact and must undergo daily testing to stay in school,” Lewis said.
“Without masks to slow down this virus while it is spreading at a high rate in the community and in schools, the likelihood of these explosions of testing and quarantines will grow.”
Sedgwick County reported more hospitalized COVID-19 patients Monday than in any weekly update since late January, according to new data from the county COVID-19 dashboard.
County Health Officer Dr. Garold Minns’ proposed mask mandate for indoor public spaces was effectively rejected by the Sedgwick County Commission on a party-line vote Friday, with Republican commissioners voting to receive and file Minns’ order without taking action.
The Wichita school board’s decision came down the same day the Food and Drug Administration granted official, full approval of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine — which has been given the name Comirnaty.
The Sedgwick County Health Department began hosting COVID-19 vaccination clinics at district high schools this week.
Anyone 12 and older is eligible to receive the vaccine, but underage students must be able to provide parental consent.
“For students ages 12-15, a parent must accompany the student in order to grant permission for the student to receive the vaccine,” a district email to parents reads. “Students ages 16-17 may bring an ID with their date of birth (driver’s license) and parents will be called to confirm consent.”
The next vaccine clinic will be at Wichita North High School 5-8 p.m. on Tuesday.
This story was originally published August 23, 2021 at 7:31 PM with the headline "Wichita schools to require masks starting next week; 194 students are COVID positive."