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Today’s entry: The Board of Ed cited negative educational impact with mask mandates when they issued the new policy. Are they just saying that or is there actual research showing a negative education impact from mask use? If there is, I’d think that’d considerably strengthen the state’s position.
Bottom Line: Yes; research exists on the impact of masks in the classroom. The Florida Board of Education stated that they adopted a rule mandating that parents can opt their children out of a school district’s mask mandate. "Unnecessarily isolating, quarantining, or subjecting children to physical COVID-19 constraints in schools poses a threat to developmental upbringing and should not occur absent a heightened showing of actual illness or serious risk of illness to other students".
Of course, Governor DeSantis also cited numerous negatives associated with the “muzzling” of kids. So, where’s this coming from? There are no fewer than 13 related studies/reviews which have been published on the National Institutes of Health’s website.
Different studies have covered different impacts of masks in the classroom. A study entitled Masked education? The benefits and burdens of wearing face masks in schools during the current Corona pandemic. Masks emphasize negative emotions over positive ones and impair the ability to connect with teachers and other students. That’s a clear negative impact for students and teachers alike and is congruent with what Governor DeSantis and the Florida Board of Education have stated. That’s not the only impact, however.
In a study entitled Face Masks in Young Children During the COVID-19 Pandemic researchers found that 81% of children were embarrassed to wear a mask at school.
That’s a huge swath of school children experiencing one of many issues which could clearly impact their ability to learn. Incidentally, the impact isn’t limited to grade school students either.
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