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12-10-2021 11:20pm
School Committee Considers Lifting High School Mask Mandate, Expands METCO to Elementary
Darlene Cancell
Editor
Image of boy removing mask in classroom by Alexandra_Koch from Pixabay
At its remote meeting of Thursday, December 9, 2021, Westwood School Committee appears poised to make masks optional at Westwood High School come January 2022, and the committee also voted to expand Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity (METCO) to the elementary school level.
COVID Infections in Westwood Public Schools and Changing Mask Policy
With over 80 percent of Westwood High School’s student and staff population vaccinated, a majority of Westwood’s School Committee is contemplating lifting the current mask mandate to make masks optional at WHS. The discussion at School Committee’s meeting to make masks optional for vaccinated high school students and staff comes after a number of anti-mask comments were made during the public comment session at a School Board meeting in October.
In offering public comment at the October 20, 2021 School Committee meeting, Mr. Justin Obey described how his children have cried because of having to don a face mask for school. They would return home from school, crying, as well. A product of Westwood Public Schools, himself, who moved back to Westwood for its schools, Mr. Obey says he has taken his children out of WPS because of the frustration his family has experienced with face masks. Another resident, Ms. Sandra Castaldini, wondered how a high school boy will know if a girl is smiling at him, or vice versa? She noted there is a social and emotional impact of masks that must be considered.
On Thursday, School Committee member Amanda Phillips cautiously proposed targeting a date in the middle of January for lifting the high school mask mandate. She noted that because things are still developing with the Omicron variant, that the mask policy should be re-examined before the target date. Committee Chair Maya Plotkin and School Committee Member Carol Lewis voiced support for the idea, with Ms. Plotkin setting forth January 18, 2022 as the target date for lifting the mask mandate. Committee members agreed to re-examine the plan to make masks optional at WHS before January 18th.
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Superintendent Emily Parks noted that COVID cases have gone up significantly in Westwood Public Schools, to about 4.5 percent positivity. At one point around Thanksgiving Break, about ten percent of the district’s sixth graders had COVID, said Superintendent Parks. That outbreak appears to have passed. Ms. Parks noted that there are currently twenty-eight student cases of COVID in WPS, four of which were break-through infections, occurring in vaccinated students. Six cases are in partially vaccinated students. All of the positive cases in staff are in fully vaccinated individuals, she said.
With only an estimated 48 percent of 5 to 11 year-olds vaccinated in WPS, the vaccinations for elementary school aged children in Westwood currently fall far short of the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education's (DESE's) threshold needed to lift the mandatory mask requirement in schools. DESE requires that 80 percent of students and staff be vaccinated before a school can make masks optional.
Even so, when elementary students return from winter break, Ms. Parks notes that the district plans to resume indoor lunches in the cafeteria, as has been the pre-pandemic routine. The mask mandate will also stay in place at Thurston Middle School, but students will have the choice to eat indoors or outdoors in January.
Ms. Parks reported that WPS is changing its COVID communication protocol between schools and families. As of next week, principals will no longer send notices to parents every time there is a positive COVID case. Instead, positive COVID cases will be posted to the WPS COVID Dashboard, which will be updated every Wednesday.
Expanding METCO to Elementary School Level
Three residents provided public comment on Thursday, shortly before the School Committee’s discussion on expanding the METCO program. All three favored expanding the METCO program to the elementary school level in Westwood. The residents noted that children make connections at elementary school that they carry with them into high school. They noted that the younger that METCO participants can be introduced to the WPS community, the greater chance of success they will have.
All School Committee members were supportive of METCO’s expansion, voting in favor of bringing it to the elementary level. Ms. Lewis did not vote on-the-record because her Zoom connection froze, but her positive comments earlier that evening indicated that she was in favor of the expansion. “It’s about time,” she said.
The proposal that School Committee approved would place 32 to 36 METCO students in WPS kindergarten through fifth grade classrooms. A likely location would be the soon to be constructed Hanlon-Deerfield school. Ms. Parks explained that the new school’s campus will be a good place to house the program, as the Hanlon and Deerfield student population is small, and could absorb additional students without exceeding a 20 student per class limit. The focus of the expanded METCO program will be on enrolling students from kindergarten through second grade.
