On Feb. 28, students will no longer be required to wear masks in school.

On Monday, Feb. 14, the District 99 Board of Education held an emergency meeting to decide what the district’s new policy would be regarding mask requirements. Superintendent Dr. Hank Thiele’s original recommendation to the board was that masks be “recommended but not required” starting on Feb. 18. This recommendation had the support of board vice president Michael Davenport and board member Jennie Hagstrom, but was later amended to a later date.

“My expertise, and experience as an educator, is to focus on not only physical health, but also the educational, well-being, social and emotional needs of our students,” Thiele said. “Health experts are not education experts… masks are getting in the way of the whole child experience. There are social emotional impacts at school… that are being blocked from this and when students leave school those are not being blocked.”

However, board president Nancy Kupka felt COVID-19 numbers are still too high to lift the current mask mandate.

“[The recommendations from the Center for Disease Control and Illinois Department of Public Health] haven’t changed and the assumption that they have just been sitting there stagnant and haven’t been continuously evaluated by public health bodies is not a right assumption,” Kupka said.

A majority of the board members seemed to agree with Kupka, which caused Thiele to amend his proposed date to Feb. 28 instead of Feb. 18. The board then voted on this amended date, and all were in favor except for Kupka.

The decision of the board, however, hinges on whether or not the appellate court upholds the lawsuit against Governor J.B. Pritzker’s mask mandate. If the temporary restraining order is dissolved, the original mask mandate will back into effect, and the decision of the board will be moot.

Many members of the community showed up to the board meeting to voice their opinions about the decision being made. All community members that spoke at the meeting were in favor of masks being made optional as soon as possible.

One student from DGN, senior Brooks Johnson, has been a strong supporter of going mask-optional, and spoke about the way he and others have been treated because of their standpoint.

“I can’t speak for everybody who wants masks required, because some people are very respectful, however, many mask-required supporters have consistently delivered hate to myself and others in the past week. There are pictures of people calling us derogatory words, giving us hate and death threats. I personally have received a death threat, both directly, and towards everyone who doesn’t want to wear a mask,” Johnson said.

DGS junior Ben Pittenger had a similar experience to Johnson.

“It is my choice to choose to not wear a mask at school, and I understand that I was put in that room because of my choice. It is also your choice to keep my education going, and put me back in class mask-less,” Pittenger said.

Thiele addressed the frustrations of the students who are protesting the mask mandate, and commended them for standing up for what they believe in. He also reminded them that protests often come with repercussions.

“If they break the rules- there are consequences to those; as was demonstrated in the times of Civil Rights, and every time after that. You can make choices, you can protest… but something is going to happen to you as a result of that,” Thiele said.

As of now, students who choose not to wear a mask will have to stay home, since the school does not have the capacity to offer a setting for students who do not follow the school policy.