Mecklenburg will change mask mandate to ensure private schools abide
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Charlotte 2021 Back to School
Due to COVID-19, masks are required at CMS and adults are encouraged to get vaccinated. There’s also a push among educators ad parents to catch up students who lost academic progress during the pandemic.
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Editor’s note: This story was updated Friday night when Mecklenburg health officials announced a change pending in the mask mandate order, and again when the Catholic schools leadership responded to that change.
Mecklenburg health leaders say they’ll revise the county’s latest mask mandate to expressly include all schools, officials told The Charlotte Observer late Friday.
The pending change comes on the heels of the head of Catholic schools in Charlotte saying he would not follow guidance to require staff and students wear masks in the classroom. And Gregory Monroe with Mecklenburg Area Catholic Schools (MACS) went further in a letter to families on Thursday, saying the county’s order didn’t apply to private schools.
Late Friday night, after the county’s update, Monroe issued a statement saying “we appreciate the Mecklenburg County Health Department’s efforts to clarify the intent and revise the language of its mask mandate. After conversations with the County today, we understand they intended for schools to be covered by the mask mandate...” Monroe added: “We will review the revised Rule and adjust our operations as necessary.” He did not explicitly say whether MACS would require masks or not.
The county’s health order mandates masks be worn in public indoors to suppress the spread of COVID-19.
The superintendent had contended that the schools are not “public spaces” so campuses would not have to follow the county’s order. There are nine Catholic schools in the Charlotte system.
The Mecklenburg County Board of Health passed a countywide mask mandate that begins Aug. 31. The rule applies to the entire county, including the six towns, and requires everyone to wear a mask inside of businesses, establishments, and other public spaces, with few exceptions. The effective date was changed from Aug. 28 after county officials announced they needed to give more notice in order to comply with law. Charlotte and two other municipalities in Mecklenburg have passed similar mandates to take effect earlier.
While worship services are exempt — as are First Amendment activities and gatherings for funerals and weddings — from the Mecklenburg mask mandate, it covers private schools, county Health Director Gibbie Harris has said.
“In terms of private schools, for example, in the document it speaks to all public, indoor spaces,” Harris said on Thursday. “That includes private entities as well as nonprofits, grocery stores, you name it. So private schools are also included in that.”
Late Friday, spokesman Andrew Fair issued a statement to The Charlotte Observer, on behalf of the health department, saying officials had spoken with Monroe Friday morning about his stance that the order would not apply to the schools he oversees. Health leaders acknowledged that while schools weren’t explicitly named in the language of the order, clarification will be added.
“This rule applies to public, private, and parochial schools in our community,” the statement read.
The reinstatement of requiring masks in public, even among vaccinated people, comes as Mecklenburg and a large portion of the United States are again gripped by the spread of the coronavirus. Data released Friday by county health officials show both the number of people hospitalized and the number of new cases identified through testing has increased in the past two weeks. The positivity rate in the county, at 13.2%, is the highest it has been in months.
Federal, state and local health officials, doctors and government leaders have particularly urged masks be worn in public when indoors as schools and colleges open classrooms again. Most area public school districts and independent schools are requiring masks for now, including some that recently changed course after initially leaving masks optional.
Catholic schools locally in the last school year did require masks indoors.
But on Thursday, before the county’s Friday evening update, Monroe announced he’d leave the decision this fall to families and individual staff members, and face coverings would be optional.
“Please be assured we also continue to monitor health data and guidance, and are relying on multi-layered health protocols to provide a safe learning environment,” he wrote.
“The current data, as well as our experience providing in-person instruction last year using a variety of masking options at our schools, reinforces that our schools are not places of high risk for virus spread,” Monroe said.
While many leading health officials agree that previous outbreaks around the country were not driven by students in classrooms, one major reason for that, research has shown, was the resiliency of young children against COVID-19 and the pains schools took to maintain social distancing, as well as the use of masks. And in recent weeks, health experts have raised concern that the Delta variant of the coronavirus is more contagious and more transmissible among unvaccinated people, which includes most school-age children.
Masks in private schools in Charlotte
Harris emphasized earlier this week that universal mask-wearing is an effective way to protect the health of children — a message in line with state and federal guidelines about the safe return to classrooms.
“We have to recognize the fact that our schools are convening ... in two weeks. All of our children are going back to school. Many of whom cannot be vaccinated, half of whom who can be vaccinated have not been vaccinated.
“So we know we’ve got a situation that could cause significant issues for us for transmission of this virus in our community, especially among our young people. That’s the reason we need the masking in our community, to protect them as they get back into school. … So the bottom line is, we need people to get vaccinated. And we need people to wear masks.”
But in his letter, Monroe said the decision whether to wear a mask should be left to parents or guardians because “we respect their ability to choose when it is appropriate for their student to wear a face covering.
“Data shows children are at lower risk of contracting and experiencing severe complications from COVID-19,” Monroe said. “The Delta variant, while more contagious, has not been shown to put children at higher risk of severe complications.
“Additionally, health experts say the COVID-19 vaccine protects older populations with whom children might come into contact.”
In a letter to parents in the MACS’ “Faithfully Forward” that outlines Covid-19 guidelines, Monroe praised the way his schools responded during the pandemic last year.
MACS held in-person instruction through the 2020-2021 school year, and masks were required in the school for staff and students. This year, the sanitation of classrooms, hand-washing, social distancing of 3 feet and contact tracing will be prioritized, among other health and safety protocols.
Even with masks required last year, at least one local MACS school, Charlotte Catholic High, had to abruptly switch in early 2021 to remote-only learning after one-third of the student body was in COVID quarantine amid positive cases.
According to its 2019-20 MACS State of the Schools Report, 4,633 students were enrolled that year across all campuses.
Monroe says in his letter that positive cases from the school year were linked back to virus exposure that happened away from school, and that most campuses did not have to shut their classrooms.
“Additional successes are apparent through our summer camp programs operating for two consecutive summers without a single COVID case. It truly was a team effort,” he wrote.
Many of the private schools in Charlotte announced they’d require masks even before Mecklenburg’s recent mandate.
At Charlotte Latin, Charlotte Country Day and Providence Day schools, masks are required indoors for all students and employees regardless of vaccination status. Masks are not required outdoors.
This story was originally published August 20, 2021 at 12:28 PM.
