Dear Saklan Community,
As I am sure you are aware, the Covid landscape keeps changing. On Monday, the CDPH rolled out new guidelines but stated they would be waiting until the 28th of February to announce any K-12 school changes.
For Saklan, we have kept the outdoor masking protocol in place to keep students safe and in school. The wording of county guidance in the Fall meant an unmasked positive case (even outside) would have caused any close contacts to quarantine for ten days. Once vaccines became more prevalent, guidance reflected that vaccinated students could stay in school as long as they were asymptomatic. A large majority of our community is vaccinated and we feel it is time for this change to be reflected in our approach.
As the Omicron surge recedes, the Covid-19 Task Force has recommended moving towards optional outdoor masking. First, however, we need to determine a few essential logistical pieces (protocols for indoor/outdoor masking guidelines, updated student vaccination information for quarantine protocols, etc). We expect to share an email early next week with more specifics and make Thursday, February 24th, the day we initiate optional outdoor masking.
Tangentially, during the surge, we required that students use masks that were at least as effective as surgical ones. A correctly fitting mask of any kind is probably better than an ill-fitting “good” mask. While we will no longer require any specific type of mask, we recommend well-fitting "good" masks (see below).
