Following an emergency Sunday meeting, the District 303 School Board announced that wearing masks will be optional at all district schools.
The decision follows a Friday ruling from a Sangamon County judge issuing a temporary restraining order on the Governor’s mask mandate for schools, arguing that such a mandate violates due process protections.
The ruling also accused Pritzker of trying to do an end-run around the issue by having the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) issue the policies, rather than the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH).
“IDPH passed the buck to schools so as not not trigger the due process protections under [state law],” Judge Grischow wrote. “IDPH cannot delegate its duties and responsibilities to ISBE and then stand on the sidelines with its hands in the air, saying, ‘it wasn’t us. We didn’t exclude kids. We didn’t mandate vaccines. We didn’t implement a mask mandate…the schools did.’”
In a statement after the meeting, School Board President Jillian Barker requested staff and students to continue to voluntarily wear masks.
“Given the current rates of transmission in our community, District 303 highly recommends that students and staff members continue to wear masks as a mitigation strategy to lessen the spread of COVID-19 in our schools,” Barker said. “As a community, we are nearing a time when declining cases will allow us to return to a sense of normalcy. We ask that everyone works together to continue to support the safety of our students.”
Geneva’s School Board has planned an emergency meeting today, after cancelling classes to address the new situation.
On Friday, Governor Pritzker announced that he would seek an “expedited appeal” from an appellate court to stay the judge’s ruling.
