Chilkat Valley News - Serving Haines and Klukwan, Alaska since 1966

A handful of protesters gathered in front of the Haines School every day this week, before and after classes, to voice opposition to the school's mask mandate.

The demonstrators - no more than five or six - displayed numerous signs, with such phrases as "My Body, My Choice," "Make School Great Again" and "Unmask the Kids."

"Our kids deserve the right to breathe clean, fresh air," said Christal Verhamme, who organized the protest and has a daughter in the district and another entering it next year. (She has already raised four kids who came through the district.) "Everyone should have their own choice."

With a unanimous vote in August, the Haines Borough school board instituted a mask requirement for all students and staff. There was a coronavirus outbreak in town at the time, following the state fair and the spread of the Delta variant. The school board has re-evaluated its mitigation protocols on a monthly basis, but has not lifted the mask requirement, saying universal masking has helped prevent spread of the virus at school and would not be eased until community transmission ended.

In an email this week to families, superintendent Roy Getchell said the criteria for making masks optional, as devised by the school board on Jan. 4, are: a) no school-related cases; and b) no active cases in the borough known to be caused by community transmission.

Boroughwide case counts have been steadily high over the last two months, higher even than they were in August, according to state data. But Getchell said school-related cases have declined over the last two weeks and that he is hopeful the school will reach its criteria soon.

Haines High senior Caleb Holm said it was noteworthy that few students participated in the protest. At least one student counter-protested on Tuesday.

Holm said most people he knows at school aren't bothered by masks.

"Right now, with how many kids we've had test positive, I think it's fine to keep the mask mandate," Holm said. "It's hard to remove the mask mandate when the risk has been so high for so long. I get why they've kept the mandate and I don't think it should go away yet."

Senior Natalie Jobbins said school administrators have already said masks will be optional once community spread ends.

"I think it's interesting that Mr. Getchell put out that (email to the community) that once we go low-risk masks will be optional, and despite that fact, which is what (the protesters) want, they're still trying to protest," Jobbins said.

The Skagway School District lifted its mask mandate in late January, making face coverings optional while encouraging their use. Based on preliminary state data, there still appears to be community transmission in Skagway. The Anchorage School District planned to ease its requirement earlier in the month but extended it due to the rapid Omicron surge.

About half of school districts nationwide require students to wear masks, according to information compiled by MCH Strategic Data and the CDC.

Several states have ended indoor universal masking policies in recent weeks but have left school boards to decide whether to retain mandates for students and teachers.

Verhamme said she has had the idea for a protest since the beginning of the school year, but waited each month to see if the school board would change its policy. "The date just keeps getting moved and moved," Verhamme said.

For Susie McCartney, who attended the protest, easing the mask policy would promote inclusion - for those families and children who choose to wear masks as well as those who choose not to.

"Everybody talks about trusting the science. And science is a method, not a religion. There are ample studies that suggest that at some point in time, wearing masks and being very careful around each other was the prudent and pragmatic thing to do. At this point, two years later, the time has come. The pandemic has shifted into an endemic situation. Children are at a low risk," McCartney said. "We are out here not suggesting that no one wear a mask, but that it is past time to let children take their masks off."

The demonstrators offered coffee, muffins and entry into a raffle for $100 to participants. Verhamme said she would protest at the school every day until a school board meeting on Feb. 22.

The CDC recommends universal masking for K-12 students and staff. A study cited by the CDC last September found that, in Arizona, the odds of an outbreak at schools without a universal mask policy were 3.5 times higher than at schools with universal masking.

But several scientists have raised questions about the integrity of that study, including its failure to account for outbreak size and to control for possible confounding factors like vaccination status, according to reports in The Atlantic.

The World Health Organization recommends not requiring masks for young children due to concerns about the effects of masking on learning and social development.The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control also recommends that students under the age of 12 not be required to wear masks, but it advises teachers to wear them, as well as high school students in areas of community transmission.