Central School Board reverses course, unanimously votes to uphold mask mandate

CAMP POINT, Ill. — Central’s teachers spoke. Central’s School Board listened.

Six days after voting 3-2 to ignore Gov. JB Pritzker’s mask mandate for students, teachers and staff — regardless of vaccination status — the Central School Board reversed course Wednesday night. It voted 7-0 to make masks mandatory in all four school buildings in the Community Unit School District No. 3.

Central teachers Emily Obert, Amy Hildebrand, Andrew Reynolds, Shelly Kramer, Alison Myers and Amanda Shoopman addressed the School Board. 

Myers read the names of the 48 seniors at Central High School. She asked the School Board to “keep them in mind when you vote.” Cramer said school officials told her to “stop spending anything out of my budget at work” and listened to coworkers’ concerns on if they should do different group work and activities. Obert listed concerns about losing retirement time and teachers’ licensing. Hildebrand explained the schools would no longer have special education services, the ability to levy for taxes, any of the district’s paraprofessionals, vocational classes and dual credit courses at John Wood Community College.

Shoopman, a first grade teacher, said no one organized the teachers to speak.

“I had planned (my speech) all day,” she said. “I have been thinking about doing it for several days, and I had actually reached out to the School Board over the weekend after they had made their last vote.

“Several of us are parents as well as educators, so we are passionate about this. This is our life, in school and out of school. We all felt like we needed to do this. Even when you talk in passing in the hallway, someone may say something like, ‘Are you going to the Board meeting tonight?’ … It just shows you that we are all on the same page.”

Letter from ISBE ‘kind of scared me’

So were the School Board members. Board president Jason Ippensen had an inkling change could be coming after last Thursday’s meeting.

“As soon as the vote was over and we got out of the meeting last week, there was some doubt cast immediately,” he said. “There was a lot of conversation.”

“It just put a lot of pressure on all of us,” School Board member Chris Marlow said. “It was maybe a spur-of-the-moment decision for some, and we were missing two board members at the time, too.”

Curt Fessler and Kindel Kestner were absent from last Thursday’s meeting. Ben Hamilton, Devin Hildebrand and Jason Cooley changed their votes.

Superintendent Erica Smith said a letter from the Illinois State Board of Education on Monday informing the district it had been placed on probation. It also has 60 days to avoid having its status changed to “unrecognized.”

“We knew the letter was coming. I was totally shocked how quick it came,” Marlow said. “That kind of scared me honestly. We needed to move quick.”

Marlow held printouts of several emails sent by disgruntled parents to School Board members in the past week. He called the number of phone calls and texts he received “overwhelming.”

“I just wish they would have spoke up sooner,” Hamilton said. “I don’t believe from a standpoint of local control that I’m wrong, but the community obviously spoke, and I’m not afraid to admit I made a mistake. They told me I did, so I’ll do what they want me to do.”

‘Test to Stay’ protocol returned to ‘Back to School Plan’

The motion to change the district’s “Back to School Plan” to make masks mandatory also came with the motion to add the “Test to Stay” protocol back to the document. If a person at the school tests positive for COVID, and that person and all people within close contact were wearing masks, the people within close contact could stay in school if they agreed to being tested for COVID-19 four times during the next seven days. The protocol specifies that when masks are universally worn in the school, close contacts are defined as individuals within three feet. Six feet is used for close contact when masks are not worn.

Even Nikki Buehler, a parent of two Central students, seemed resigned to the fate of the mask mandate. A member of We Stand for Students, a community group concerned about parent choice regarding mask options, Buehler made one last plea to the Board to continue the fight.

“Nobody wants to lose recognition status,” she said. “Nobody wants our diplomas to be at risk, and nobody wants our kids to lose out on playing time. Gosh, they lost out on so much last year. We don’t want that. But we could try to find another avenue or maybe put another corrective action plan together that’s maybe a little bit outside of the box?

“But if you guys feel it’s best that we take an immediate action and reverse. I will respect that, because I know you guys want to do what’s right for our kids.”