Students in Illinois are returning to full-time, in-person learning in the fall. With that comes a mixed bag of requirements for masking.
Here's what the Illinois Department of Public Health's guidance is for K-12 schools:
- Fully-vaccinated staff members and students do not have to wear a mask
- Unvaccinated staff members and students need to wear a mask indoors
- Three feet of distance between students needs to be maintained in the classroom
- Additional mitigation strategies should be implemented
- Screening testing
- Ventilation
- Handwashing
- Coughing etiquette
- Contact tracing
- Staying home when not feeling well
- Cleaning / sanitizing
Vaccines continue to not be available to kids under age 12, so that entire student population will have to wear masks.
The 2021-2022 school year will be fully in-person. However, remote instruction has to be made available for students if they are under a quarantine order.
“With vaccination rates continually rising and unprecedented federal funding to support safe in-person learning, and mitigations such as contact tracing and increased ventilation in place in schools, we are fully confident in the safety of in-person learning this fall," said State Superintendent of Education, Dr. Carmen I. Ayala.
The CDC is not advising schools to require shots for teachers and vaccine-eligible kids. And it's not offering guidance on how teachers can know which students are vaccinated or how parents will know which teachers are immunized.
