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Kalamazoo Public Schools board votes to extend mask mandate


The Kalamazoo Public Schools building is pictured in this photo. Kalamazoo Public Schools extend the mask mandate for both students and staff members on Thursday during a board meeting. (Jon McCrary/WWMT)
The Kalamazoo Public Schools building is pictured in this photo. Kalamazoo Public Schools extend the mask mandate for both students and staff members on Thursday during a board meeting. (Jon McCrary/WWMT)
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Students and staff at Kalamazoo Public Schools will be required to wear masks in all district buildings until at least May 4.

The school board voted 5-2 Thursday to keep the mask mandate in place for an additional two weeks, following a recommendation from Rita Raichoudhuri, Kalamazoo Public Schools superintendent.

The vote remained the same from a similar vote at the board's April 7 meeting, with the same five school board members agreeing to extend the mandate, while the same two members voted against it.

"Our children are going home without masks. They're going to Meijer without masks. They're playing with their friends on the street without masks. They're doing all of this and somehow we think that if we mask them in our schools that we're doing something," said Ken Greschak, Kalamazoo Public Schools Board Treasurer. "We're not doing anything."

Raichoudhuri recommended extending the mandate based on coronavirus data from the Michigan Dept. of Health & Human Services. According to the agency's weekly update published Wednesday, there have been 10,474 infections confirmed across the state in the past week.

Coronavirus cases in Kalamazoo County over the past week are also up 30% ,and almost 11% of all tests are coming back positive, according to Raichoudhuri.

"We told families when we offered the option to go from virtual to in-person that we would offer a mask mandate, and a lot of families made that decision knowing that we were going to have masks," said Megan Maddock, Kalamazoo Public Schools Board Trustee.

Kalamazoo Public Schools is the only school district in Kalamazoo County with a mask mandate still in place for students and staff members.

The school board said it will revisit the mask mandate in a meeting on May 4, 26 days before the end of the school year.

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