Discourse remains civil as community addresses GCSC board over masks

When all was said and done, Monday’s Greencastle School Board meeting did not go viral.

Strong opposing viewpoints were expressed but order was maintained as a sizable contingent of community members came to express their opinions on a mask mandate returning to Greencastle Community Schools.

The flashpoint for the debate came one week before the meeting when, amid rising cases of the COVID-19 delta variant and the subsequent contact tracing in schools, GCSC reimposed the requirement that all students and staff members wear masks while inside school buildings.

Greencastle is thus far the only county school corporation to return to masks during the new school year.

The board took efforts to keep the discourse civil, with President Mike White recommending that anyone planning to speak pick up a copy of the board policies on public comment.

White also noted that comments are not normally welcome on items not on the agenda.

“There is nothing on the agenda about our back-to-school plan or a mask mandate, however we know it’s a relatively emotional topic in town,” White said. “So we’re going to deviate from that a little bit and allow public comments on that.”

Finally, White gave a warning regarding expectations of speakers.

“We require that we are respectful — respectful to the board, respectful to people with opposing viewpoints,” White said. “Once the meeting becomes abusive or is personally directed or we’re out of line, comments are over.

“I know everyone has probably seen YouTube videos of meetings in Clay County, Avon, Carmel-Clay school systems — that’s not what we’re doing here tonight. If you want to make a comment you will respectfully make a comment.”

With that, the meeting never really crossed the line.

Several speaking in opposition to the mask mandate did so out of concerns for the quality of education for children while they and the staff members are masked.

One mother explained that her son is hearing impaired and between the difficulty for teachers to project their voices while masked and the need to see mouth movement, learning has become even more challenging for him.

Another mom said she has two autistic children who are struggling with the masks. One has been taught from a young age to follow facial expressions for social cues and his behavior is being negatively impacted by his inability to do so under the mask mandate.

The other has a speech impediment and is now refusing to go to school because he is made fun of for how much more difficult he is to understand while masked.

Deer Meadow teacher Holli Hill spoke of the difficulty to reach small children while masked.

“It is really, really hard for us to teach them how to manipulate sounds,” Hill said. “It is hard for us to see how they use the sounds that I’m saying, how to write down the sounds that I’m saying, how to copy the sounds that I’m saying. Today I tried to spell the word cap — c-a-p — and those letters that don’t have a voice sound to them, they had a really hard time understanding what I’m saying or at least being able to read my lips a little bit.”

With this in mind, she asked for a bit of concession like there was last year for situations in which masks are not required.

Another parent, David Kean, spoke of his two primary-aged children being afraid of the repercussions if they don’t wear masks.

“They feel it’s a punishment,” Kean said. “They thought that if they were going to go to school without a mask, they were going to get punished.”

Several others spoke of the mask mandate as a matter of civil liberties being taken.

“There’s a living, breathing history being played out right before us, right now,” Jody Gooch said. “And I’d like to challenge the history and civics teachers. There are unbelievable lessons with the civil liberties that have just been crushed, ignored and stamped on, and we’re just moving on. The rules keep changing.”

Finally, more than one parent warned of falling enrollment if the mandate continues.

Morgan Shoopman said she took her children out last week and began homeschooling following the return of the mandate.

“If you do see a drop in enrollment, it could be because parents are sick and tired and are pulling their children out,” Shoopman said.

Parent Greg Velazquez agreed.

“You are looking at a mass exodus of students if this keeps up,” Velazquez said.

Still the mandate had its supporters among the speakers, such as parent and GMS teacher Alisa Isaacs-Bailey.

“I don’t like wearing a mask, but I do it,” Isaacs-Bailey said. “And I do it because, to me being patriotic, to me loving my country means loving the people who live in it. I’m vaccinated — there’s a good chance I could go to school without wearing a mask and never get sick at all.

“I’m wearing it to keep your kids from getting sick from me. Because the studies have shown that even vaccinated people could carry COVID and could spread it.”

Parent Maggie Rogers said she homeschooled last year because of the mask mandate, but that she supports the decision of the GCSC administration to return to masks.

Rogers said she’s read studies that overwhelmingly say masks work and has not found one that says otherwise, though she’s looked. She also said that she did not believe that government indoctrination was occurring, nor that civil liberties were being seriously curtailed, citing George Washington forcing his Revolutionary War troops to get the smallpox vaccine as well as United States Supreme Court decisions upholding mask mandates.

“I think the people who are against masks and vaccines are placing a huge burden on the rest of the community,” Rogers said.

It was during Rogers’ comments that White gave his only warning of the evening about someone in the crowd being disrespectful and the rumblings quickly quieted.

Parent Stephanie Gurnon also expressed her support for masks. Gurnon, who has a master’s degree in medical genetics, formerly worked at Riley Children’s Hospital and now works in multiple children’s hospitals, said serious cases of the delta variant are more prevalent in children than many people believe.

“What I can tell you is that this is harmful to kids,” Gurnon said. “Right now, one percent, one out of 100 — which when I worked in genetics I had patients that had conditions that I considered common if it was one in 10,000 — so one in 100 kids is being hospitalized with delta variant of COVID. There have been hundreds of deaths over the summer. That is not a gamble I think we should mess with. If it is your child, it will matter to you, I promise.”

Gurnon went on to say that some of the problems that had been pointed out earlier in the meeting were solvable if the community worked together.

For those who cited the inability of kids to communicate well with cloth over their faces, there are clear masks available or clear hoods for the teachers to make communication clearer.

For those who cited dirty masks particularly among small children, there could be donations from the community.

“I would be the first to donate masks for children who are showing up with dirty masks or are dropping them on the playground and are needing another,” Gurnon said. “I think these are problems that are solvable.”

Gurnon wasn’t the only speaker trying to find some middle ground.

Parent Jessica Knecht questioned why the virtual option was not still available.

“Why aren’t we doing the virtual option?” she asked. “Last year we did, this year we aren’t. I don’t want to send my kids in a mask.”

Parent, husband of a teacher and local business owner Paul Jedele simply asked that the administration be more transparent about what is guiding its decisions regarding masks and other policies.

“Where I challenge the school board is where is the threshold where we get to take the masks off in the school?” Jedele asked. “At what level do we change and maybe have to instill more protocol like more daily cleanings? I’ve just not seen much based upon cases per hundred thousand, positivity rates, you name it. I think it would help all of us here if we kind of had a threshold.”

Jedele said he did this for his McDonald’s employees and it helped morale regarding masks if they at least understood the point at which masks could be removed.

While masks were not on the agenda, Supt. Jeff Gibboney used his report later in the meeting to address some of the issues and perhaps shed some light on the decision-making process.

“Our goal this year was to return to as much of a more traditional school day as possible with some of our protocols in place.,” Gibboney said. “Unfortunately, the number of students to have cases in our school district and the complications with contact tracing and the amount of students that it’s displacing from our classrooms, we just weren’t going to be able to continue to operate that way and have our students in person, which we philosophically believe is best for students — in the physical classroom in the presence of their teacher.”

He said he understood the difficulty and passion on both sides.

“But the revision was made with two goals in mind,” Gibboney said. “One was for the safety of our students and our staff. The second one was keeping as many of our students in the classroom and engaged in in-person instruction as possible. When we’re having to quarantine 10 to 15 students from a 25-student classroom, that’s not ideal. We can’t expect our educators to teach both in person and virtual at the same time.”

He added that it’s important to protect special events, both in the arts and athletics. However, the ISDH rules for contact tracing would not have made such events possible.

“So the decision was made to mandate masks K through 12,” Gibboney said. “With that in mind, according to the CDC guidelines, there’s an exception there to where if all students and staff are masked and you’re not within three feet you don’t have to quarantine those close contacts. That close contact exception would allow us to keep our students in the classroom and not quarantine as many of our students as we have been.”

Gibboney continued that the plan is subject to change as the year continues and the pandemic develops.

“I’ve yet to see a real good metric to operate by, but there are things we are going to continue to look at,” Gibboney said. “We are going to continue to look at the data within our own classrooms and within our own school system to see if we can make adjustments, to see if we can provide some additional opportunities or places where we’re not requiring masks.

“I think that’s what we all want and I know that’s personally what I want and we’re going to continue to monitor this and adjust accordingly,” Gibboney added. “But we can’t just turn our backs and not follow any of the guidance, whether it’s from the CDC or the State Department of Health.”

The remainder of the agenda from the Greencastle School Board meeting will be reported in a separate story.