Secondary School Children - Does Yours Wear A Mask?

[IfOnlyOurEyesSawSouls]

Hi

If you have a secondary school age child does he /she wear a mask at school?

If yes how do they feel about it?

If the answer is no how do you feel about it and how do you manage the situation?

No covid deniers please... Im a frontline registered nurse and deal with the trauma of covid everyday .

Many thanks

School have just changed policy to reinstate masks, no one was wearing them before yesterday. Does she wear them? yes/no - she tries but struggles (SEN).

I don't worry about it, she has had Covid already and was fine. We all have had Covid and her Dad was hospitalised, but recovered. DH caught it at a hospital appointment and gave it to all of us. We are vaccinated now too.

Initially he did. But as very few do he stopped. I encourage him but can’t do much to enforce it. Our governor has banned mask mandates and the school district chose to agree

Thankyou @Choconuttolata and @HerRoyalNotness .

In a foreign country where all our children have to wear masks all day and they have only started going back to in person school this academic year. Also 12+ are vaccinated.

Kids are used to it and fine with it. I think it’s insane they do PE outdoors in masks but there we go. DS secondary school has had one positive case in the last 5 weeks since school started again so something is working

I’m also abroad. High school are all double jabbed and wear masks every day.

My 14 year old son does.

His school instigated a mask unless eating or drinking for everyone (unless exemption blah blah) in the second week into the return to school after the first lockdown last year as they had immediate COVID outbreaks on practically day 1 and things have stayed generally under much better control there since then (excepting the last couple of weeks before Christmas 2020 when numbers rocketed like much of the rest of the country - he was sent home as a close contact but was fine).

They continued with that until the summer holidays but with the new academic year after freedom day they have left it open to choice. Apparently a lot of kids returned to school wearing a mask but when they saw that lots of others including most/all of the teachers weren’t wearing masks on day they mostly abandoned ship. My son isn’t overly worried about COVID himself but feels it is just sensible to wear a mask (he goes by school bus as well and wears it there too). He’s looked at the info about COVID for himself and is quite scathing of the anti vaxxer and anti masker points of view, more than I am.

He is probably influenced to some degree by me - I am a GP and although I am totally seeing patients despite the rhetoric, I do appreciate we have not been as exposed on the frontline in quite the same way as you, obviously I’ve had first hand experience of patients dying and having long COVID or clotting or neurological events felt to be COVId related etc. And my sister has long COVID and is still breathless and unable to work over a year later despite being super fit and well previously. So I guess I’m quite aware of what COVID can do and don’t take it lightly. Our whole wider family are quite cautious as we have lots of medics/nurses/physios etc in the family. My social circle is more mixed but there are many who are also cautious. I have heavily encouraged him to continue to wear a mask at school, but have also said I won’t insist if he feels more comfortable without it.

Fortunately he is a super confident child (not sure where he got that from!) and appears to be totally immune to peer pressure - as in he is baffled by his friends behaviour (who rapidly ditched their masks on day 1 when they realised the school were no longer making it mandatory) - he doesn’t really understand why what other people are doing would influence anyone’s actions . I think he has autistic traits (but not proper autism I don’t think) which may be part of this! He tells me he isn’t the only one in his year wearing a mask but possibly the only one in his class. He is happy enough to keep wearing one now as I have encouraged it and he agrees. He reckons maybe 5 percent of kids are wearing one now.

Meant to add I’m pretty sure I had COVID at the end of Feb 2020 - probably after seeing patients coming back from half term ski trips and Italy, Thailand etc (even had one from Wuhan…). Couldn’t get a test for myself either but I am almost sure that’s what it was. And I found it quite frightening. I didn’t need admission but was pretty much bedbound with exhaustion, fever, cough, severe headache, diarrhoea and breathlessness for a week. Couldn’t get tested for love nor money at that stage. So I’m sure that factors into my paranoia about COVID too! Just trying to keep as safe as reasonably possible and if he is happy to wear a mask then I’m not ready for him to stop wearing it quite yet, especially with numbers being what they are.

DS is 13. He wears a mask on the school bus , in between classes, and for the last week, in class too. His school has their first covid cases this week, but not in his year.

He removes his mask to eat and for PE.

He's totally unphased by it now. We've had a couple of cold early mornings and he's put it on early because he says it keeps his face warm

Hi, am in Ireland here and yes 13/14 yo wears mask. He's double jabbed and fine about it. His only problem was when they went to the school library which he said was too hot but a number of them said it and now they don't study there anymore. I've asked a number of times if it really bothers him and not at all

My 12yo doesn't, pretty much no one in high school wears masks she assures me, except if they go by bus. I was surprised.

But then I work in a primary school with the little ones, so we've not had masks at all. Each day at least one small child coughs or sneezes directly into my face. Out of all of my family, unsurprisingly, it is me who's up at 4am drinking a lemsip.

@Rainbows89

I’m also abroad. High school are all double jabbed and wear masks every day.

This makes me so jealous, and angry.

I can't believe the UK government is deliberately infecting children, I can't fully understand why I'm letting my child go in, but of course they love being with others their own age.

Mine does wear a mask, he says most don't, he doesn't mind not being identical to everyone else.

Didnt chris witty (who I normally love) say teens in uk could expect to have either had covid or get covid.

There seems to have been an acceptance by our govt that this will be the case.

No masks. Crowded open evenings happening. Cases in schools.

I'm in Canada. All high school pupils have to wear masks indoors (Provincial order) as do teachers- and kids 12+ are all double jabbed. My younger one (12) is still in Elementary school and everyone Grade 4 and above (roughly Year 5) have to wear masks indoors (plus all teachers) but can take them off when outside. The younger kids are exempt. Not many cases in schools right now - but the numbers are rising.
Also - if someone in your household has Covid you can't go to school. My sister in the UK currently has Covid and I can't believe she is meant to send her Secondary aged kid to school! He has had a negative PCR - but it seems crazy!

Work in sen school.

All staff back to masks except in classrooms and when eating (or out side!)

Pupils not asked to wear them.

Ds college haven't asked for masks but I would be supportive if they did.

Nobody in my DC's school is wearing a mask. 11-18 year olds.

Lots of primary schools in the area have reinstated masks and bubbles.

In the SW where we have an enhanced covid status (or something) kids are wearing masks in the corridors only. Mostly worn well.

Covid is rife but now no one is talking about it. PCR testing for close contacts is "advisory only". No one is isolating.

Kids will say, 'oh yeah, I did a lateral flow and it was ok' when their friend they sit next to is off with covid.

I thought it was PCR test or isolation, but apparently it's PCR test if you feel like it or carry on as normal.

We had lockdowns and isolations over the last year with almost no cases here. And now it's literally rife, except we're pretending it's fine. Back to assemblies and everything. It's bonkers.

@Photosymphysis I completely agree with you.

Its bonkers and so very frustrating.

Thankyou so very much everyone for your thoughtful replies.

I'm in Scotland so the secondary aged children still need to wear masks.

Not in the UK.
Yes they do
They're fine about it. Obviously would prefer not to but if it helps keep our already very low figures down. Possibly at the end of the month classes where everyone is vaccinated (which is most of them) will be allowed to take the masks off.

Ds has just started at FE college to do ALevels

I visited it recently and not single person who I saw there had a mask on .( except me as I was sat in a tiny airless room meeting with a couple of staff)

DS still wears one every day on the bus and arrives home with one on but I think he takes it off when there. I haven't asked him but since almost nobody else is wearing them in college I doubt he will be

I don't have children but I've not seen a secondary school child wearing a mask here since they started back.

My grandchildren in Canada have to wear a mask all day in school. Youngest grandchild is 4, he also has to wear one all day. There isn't a problem there, they are just used to it.

Yes in Scotland they never took them away in high schools

DD13 and DS11 neither wears one at school. No requirement to. Also they don't wear on school bus anymore either.

They will wear one if asked to eg hairdressers.

Both had covid in August.

I don't mind if they wear them or not.