After COVID-19 hit, she left her job, saying the profession had become politically toxic. In 2018 she was a special education support teacher in Boyertown, and became a permanent substitute in 2019. Theisen was a first-grade teacher for 13 years. Board Vice President Brian Hemingway, voted against the mask optional policy but said he didn’t “believe” in masks, and board member Marianne Scott said masks “don’t work.” 18, the board voted 5-4 in favor of a mask optional policy. The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia reported in January that most omicron cases are mild, and encouraged schools to remain open as serious risk for students has remained low.ĭuring the most recent Boyertown School Board meeting on Jan. All these children are being put at risk unnecessarily because you have people who have varying opinions and listen to news sources that aren’t genuine making these decisions.” “These decisions should be made by qualified people in the public health sector. “It’s definitely a failure that we have put public health on school board directors because they’re not qualified,” said Theisen. Theisen is working to get more families involved again. In September, about 20 parents were gearing up to sue the district for violating the Americans with Disabilities Act. Theisen removed her daughter from the district after it went mask-optional in September of 2020, putting her in a private school with more stringent mitigation efforts. Liz Theisen is a parent leading the fight and will soon begin raising money for a lawyer, “And I can already guarantee that in less than 24 hours, we have a thousand dollars worth of people who said, ‘you can put me in for that.’” In Boyertown Area School District, which straddles parts of Montgomery and Berks counties, parents are readying for a lawsuit of their own. Groups of parents in neighboring districts are inspired by the current success of the Perkiomen lawsuit. Most of the rise in serious cases has come from unvaccinated people. The Montgomery County Department of Health is encouraging schools “to continue to require mask-wearing as recommended by the CDC.” Even as local health officials say the omicron surge has peaked, COVID transmission rates remain high, with hospitalizations exceeding totals in the last two weeks compared to any other time during the pandemic. While it isn’t the focus of De Gisi’s case, he agreed that some of the students involved in the trial have struggled with virtual learning. “The whole idea is exactly the same.”Ĭooper added that some of his Perkiomen clients report that the district’s virtual learning option is not robust enough for kids with disabilities. “It’s not going to detrimentally impact other children or staff at that building to have a wheelchair around for kids that have physical disabilities that prevent them from walking up stairs,” said Cooper. Cooper related universal masking to other forms of inclusivity in school buildings, like a wheelchair ramp. ![]() 4, following which she will decide whether to make the universal mask policy permanent.ĭan Cooper, a special education attorney based in Bala Cynwyd, supports the judge’s decision to mandate masks. The next trial in front of Judge Beetlestone is on Feb. ![]() All three have asthma, one student has chronic bronchitis and pneumonia, and another student has vocal cord dysfunction.Īccording to De Gisi, the plaintiffs claim the masking optional policy “discriminates against children because it forces them to either risk serious injury or death or to remove themselves from the buildings and remove their access to the buildings.” Their lawsuit states that the change of school policy “forces the parents of medically fragile school children with disabilities to make the shockingly unfair or unjust decision of deciding whether to pull their children out of in-person learning, causing mental harm and havoc on the child and family, or face the quantifiably increased risk of physical harm caused by exposure to severe illness or death as a result of COVID-19.”Īll three students are “medically vulnerable,” according to the suit. The three sets of Perkiomen parents who filed the suit are remaining anonymous, in “fear of retaliation and violence for this suit, due to the charged nature of the masked mandate debate,” according to a motion filed by their lawyer Carmen De Gisi. ![]() WHYY thanks our sponsors - become a WHYY sponsor
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