SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS RADIO) – Masks are back at Berkeley public schools as of Monday morning.
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Berkeley students are required to wear masks indoors for the final two weeks of the school year, one of several steps the Berkeley Unified School District is taking to keep kids from getting sick amid rising COVID-19 case numbers in its schools. The masking rule also extends to all indoor school events, including graduations.
The decision to reinstate the mandate comes based on a "strong" recommendation from the city of Berkeley's local health officer Dr. Lisa Hernandez, according to a release by District Superintendent Brent Stephens on Friday.
Transmission at schools was rare earlier in the pandemic, but the current omicron strain is so contagious that students are catching COVID in the classroom. District spokesperson Trish McDermott told KCBS Radio that there's been "increasing numbers of COVID clusters. So this is multiple cases we are seeing in our classrooms."
In addition, the district currently only has enough substitutes to cover about half of the virus-driven teacher absences, which has forced district administrators and teachers during their planning periods to fill in for their ill colleagues, Stephens stated.
Nicole Shannon, the parent of a 1st grader at John Muir Elementary School, said reinstating the masking policy was a prudent decision.
"There’s a lot of COVID cases going on here, so I think the masks are another way for kids not to put things in their mouths, touch objects, pick them up," she told KCBS Radio.
The district is also moving all administrative meetings online and pushing indoor activities outside when possible.
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