With the Pa. Department of Health’s statewide school mask mandate struck down on Dec. 10 by the Pa. Supreme Court, it was no surprise that the debate continued at the Dec. 21 Saucon Valley School Board meeting.

The district’s current Health and Safety Plan - which automatically went into effect as of the Dec. 10 court ruling - calls for a ‘tiered’ masking strategy based on weekly tallies of reported positive tests throughout campus.

It was reported that all three Saucon buildings – the elementary, middle and high schools share a campus but are distributed across dedicated facilities – were fully ‘mask optional’ for all students and staff for the week of Dec. 13, however, at least two of the buildings were again requiring masks the following week due to an increase in cases.

Board member Edward Andres - who has led the charge at recent meetings advocating for relaxing guidelines - said he was “saddened” to hear that when the mandate was struck down, the superintendent did not immediately communicate to families that the DoH’s quarantine guidelines were also discarded.

Andres (who once again was the only member of the board or administration who refused to wear a mask) agreed with a parent who spoke at the beginning of the meeting. The woman said she felt discriminated against for choosing not to vaccinate her child against COVID-19. “I feel for this parent,” Andres said, referring to the Plan as it was written at the time, saying it promoted “discrimination based on vaccination status.”

Andres criticized upcoming upperclass trips to educational sites in cities like Philadelphia which have implemented citywide vaccination requirements in certain businesses and compared such policies to segregationist Jim Crow laws in the post-Civil War south.

Andres also suggested the Plan recognize religious objections and ‘natural immunity’ and cited Dr. Jeffrey Jahre, Chief of Infectious Diseases at St. Luke’s, who made national news on FOX News’ Tucker Carlson Tonight. In his appearances, Jahre discussed the healthcare network’s disregard for CDC guidelines while allowing unvaccinated employees that have recovered from COVID to bypass its immunization requirements.

Andres eventually motioned to alter the language in a form letter sent from Interim Superintendent Jaime Vlasaty’s office to families in the event of a student being deemed a ‘close contact’ to another who tests positive.

The letters should include no indication whether the positive student was vaccinated or not (or masked or not when under ‘optional masking’), he said, with the district’s “recommendation” to quarantine following CDC standards, not a requirement. Board member Bryan Eichfeld agreed, adding, “What we’re doing right now is excluding kids who are healthy,” asymptomatic close contacts who never test positive.

After well over an hour of debate over semantics and minutia but with little pushback on Andres’ general opinions, the board voted unanimously in favor of his motion. District families can now choose whether or not to quarantine and test their asymptomatic parents in the event of a notification of an exposure. It was noted that students’ absences due to quarantining will continue to be considered excused.

A few district parents and residents attended the public comment portion following the vote, with all in support of optional masking. However, two high school students - Hunter Gress and Ellen Stern - spoke in favor of making cautious choices.

Stern, who first spoke up at the Dec. 7 meeting, said she felt “high school students and teachers are being kind of ignored in these meetings… you never talk about us.” She noted that since secondary-level students change classes frequently and often are broken down into more specialized subjects, ‘mask-only’ classrooms as laid out in the Plan aren’t practical at that level.

Stern also referred to Andres’ claims of “discrimination” concerning the aforementioned topic of class trips, saying it is “a dangerous word to be using.” She suggested that particular board members’ deployment of the term is disrespectful to students who “are in a wheelchair, blind, hard of hearing,” adding, “you can’t only use discrimination when it comes to vaccinations.”

Gress spoke briefly, noting the many attendees and Andres who, he said, did not “seem to want to follow” the Plan regarding masks. “I think it definitely speaks volumes” that some of those who voted to implement the procedures did not follow them that evening, he said.