Northampton Drops Abusive Mask Mandate

Northampton County School board announced it would drop its abusive and arbitrary mask mandate in obedience to a state law that allows parents to decide whether their children wear masks at school.

Faced with the new mask-optional law, the board, which had resisted Youngkin’s push for mask-optionality, cowered Tuesday when they announced that the “policy” is now masks optional.

In what could construed as yet another sad and futile gesture, an attempt to save face, the school system released the following statement:

“We will continue to strongly encourage mask wearing as a key strategy in our efforts to reduce the spread of COVID-19 in our schools and community.

“It is important to note that masks will still be required in certain cases: · Per Federal regulations, students are required to continue wearing masks on school buses. · Students will be required to wear masks when returning to school on days 6-10 after testing positive for COVID-19 or being identified as a close contact of someone who is COVID-19 positive. · All employees, visitors, and volunteers shall continue to wear masks, per Virginia Department of Labor and Industry Standards, which state that school employees are required to wear masks in areas of substantial or high community transmission regardless of vaccination status. Northampton County remains in a “high transmission” phase.  

“As a school division, we will continue to review and update our mitigation strategies to keep our staff and students safe and our schools open for the remainder of the school year. As always, thank you for your flexibility, support, and understanding as we navigate the many challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic.”