Hopkinton School Committee To Vote Thursday On Student Masking

HOPKINTON, MA — The School Committee will decide Thursday whether to require students to wear masks when the 2021-22 school year begins.

The committee, which met Wednesday evening with the Board of Health, will vote on the matter during its meeting at 7 p.m. Thursday to be held at the Hopkinton High School library and broadcasted on HCAM.

"We should use all the tools available, so I recommend utilizing face coverings," Hopkinton Health Director Shaun McAuliffe told the committee. "If we are not relying on masks, then we're not providing a structured environment and are introducing unnecessary risk."

"We really think masks are an important tool in our toolbox," added health board Chairman Elizabeth Whittemore.

Health board member Richard Jacobs echoed the point.

"The key thing is we make sure we have a successful school year," he said. "We need to minimize the chance of an interruption, so it might make sense to consider a temporary mask mandate for the first month of two."

School Superintendent Carol Cavanaugh conceded that the school committee "has a very difficult decision to make.

"We're fortunate to live in a highly vaccinated community," she said, "but we have thousands [of children] who can't be vaccinated."

McAuliffe said Hopkinton officials "went to great lengths to get the town vaccinated, so we are in the top five for communities over 10,000 [population], adding that vaccination clinics for children could be mobilized within a week of federal approval of vaccines for those 11 and under.

Hopkinton has had 38 cases of COVID-19 since Aug. 1, Whittemore said. About a third occurred in groups who were not vaccinated-eligible, she said, and 17 were breakthrough cases.

McAuliffe said the new cases included young adults and youth from high risk-situations such as travel or attendance at large gatherings.

The Centers for Disease Control and other agencies "recommend" but don't require face coverings, which committee member Joe Markey said has made local decisions difficult.

"This discussion will make the [school committee's] decision maybe not easier, but definitely more informed," Cavanaugh said.

Whittemore added, "Whatever you decide tomorrow, in three weeks, you'll probably be deciding something else."