West Contra Costa Unified School District teachers will soon be required to wear KN-95 face masks while working to prevent the spread of COVID-19, district officials said this week.
The KN-95 requirement for the district’s some 3,000 classified and certified teachers and other educational staff members will take effect Monday, with the district providing one mask per week to teachers for the rest of the school year.
While masks have been required for teachers and school staff throughout the pandemic, some cloth masks and other non-medical face coverings are unlikely to offer the same protection against spreading or contracting the highly contagious omicron variant of the virus as medical-grade N-95 and KN-95 masks.
“Experts agree that these masks offer extra protection against the COVID-19 virus,” district Superintendent Kenneth Chris Hurst said in a statement. “The safety of our students and staff is our top priority, and we believe this is another important preventive measure we must take at this time.”
In the meantime, the district’s educators have been stretched thin by a raft of COVID-19 cases and exposures as students returned to school this week, according to Marissa Glidden, the president of the United Teachers of Richmond, the district’s teachers’ union.
More than 500 teachers and educational staff were out on COVID leave Wednesday due to either a positive test or exposure to the virus, Glidden said.
In addition, a dearth of available substitute teachers has forced many district officials into the classroom. However, a “significant number” of district officials are also out sick, further exacerbating the issue, Glidden said.
“We do appreciate that they’re doing that,” Glidden said. “They’re really going for it, they’re trying.
It’s just an impossible problem, I don’t know what we do.”
A spokesperson for the district did not respond to a request for comment on district officials filling in for absent educators.
The district also distributed 15,000 COVID-19 testing kits to students on Sunday in an effort to help them test for the virus prior to returning to campus on Monday.
As a result, some 6,400 of the district’s 28,000 students were absent on Tuesday. According to Glidden, the district’s attendance rate is normally around 98 percent.
“The spike in cases because of the omicron variant requires us to take further action to protect our staff members and school communities.” Hurst said.
Glidden added that, since the state allocates educational funding based on student attendance, the district is not receiving funding for students who are absent due to COVID exposure or a positive test, even though they are required to stay home.
The district said it expects to receive the KN-95 masks by the end of this week, with the intent of distributing them to campuses before Monday.
36 comments
How incompetent are these people? KN-95 is a Chinese standard. N95 is a NIOSH standard. The original strain of COVID was deadlier and we didn’t really know what was going on. Did they wear respirators then? No. I was called a racist for wearing an N95. It’s clear that Omicron is just the sniffles. If you’re not Obese, it’s not even just the flu- it’s a mild cold. But when they require KN-95s that you buy off Amazon that are probably fake anyway- it’s time to say the emperor has no clothes.
If you’re in a high risk group- get a real N95. Learn to wear it properly. Otherwise stop with this nonsense. It’s just the common cold.
Yep. Those at risk are the ones that need to take the precautions. It is sad for them, but why have everyone suffer for less than 1% of people who might die? If anything, this should be a call for people to choose to take better care of themselves.
They’d better be getting a truckload of them.
KN95 masks are not as good as N95 masks, and N95 masks should be used for no more than 3-4 hours at a time and then discarded. KN95 masks meet the Chinese standards, not U.S. standards. So more money for China, and less “protection” for the teachers.
This is fun, all these people chasing their tails.
https://www.healthline.com/health-news/report-finds-kn95-masks-not-as-effective-as-n95-masks
Correct…In addition, unless the N95 respirator is properly “fit tested” it is useless. One mask per week is inadequate. There should be five masks for each user that are rotated one per day until they do not seal properly or become stained or damaged.
Unfortunately, much like cloth masks, this “solution” only makes people fell better without actually accomplishing anything.
How about following the science?
OMG!!!
MAKE THIS END!!
This is leftover stock from the Wuhan China facility.. if course they got a good deal on it. China also threw in 2 tons of rice in the deal..
Last year at this time a package of 10 count KN95 masks manufactured in China was selling for $30.00 plus tax at Ace Hardware in Walnut Creek. That’s $3.00 per mask and they are to be worn only a short period of time costing the individual wearing it about $1.00 an hour to wear one. After about 3-4 hours the mask is to be discarded. The surgical type of mask can be worn 8-10 hours and then discarded. Issuing one N95 mask for the entire week seems risky for infection control. Who’s paying for all this stuff, anyway?
In dental… per osha guidelines, masks must be disposed of after every patient. Last year we were wearing the same masks for days due to the shortage and mass population taking all the medical resources.
N95’s are more air restrictive and you cannot teach/talk with a covered face
We have a whole wave of young children that will be having speach problems because they cannot see other peoples lips and tongue movements to properly hear/speak/and enunciate.
JUST say No! The only way out of this is through mass non-compliance. Just like the compliance everyone had to “stay the F home, and wear your FN mask”
Jesus. Thanks you guys… 2 years later…..
Governor Hair-doo bought a huge number of these masks through a questionable Chinese deal. Now is the chance to get rid of them.
No chance. You cant hear people when talking through an n95 or kn95. And these are the masks that caused all those images you saw of people with bloody abrasion marks during the Lombardy outbreak. Well done. Enjoy your law suits.
Stockholm syndrome is what this is, and people are complacent.
Fauchi has never been my savior. And his man made drug is not of gods doing. He is evil.
The collective people in the Bay Area need to just say no more.
It’s not like this I’m Sac, San Diego is mask free…it’s just here where people have lost their damn minds.
From what I know, is Due to HIPAA laws, drs cannot even talk about a patients health without a prior authorization.
And YES my medical condition may not look like a medical condition. But PTSD is real, and the mask is triggering to those who have experienced trauma.
We are taught not to discriminate upon others, and what are we doing? We are discriminating!
NO MORE, enough is enough.
Mandates are NOT laws!
More likely the people mandating this stuff have Munchausen by Proxy.
Hahaha china masks for the propagandists. It’s poetic.
60% of K95 masks are counterfeit too
One mask per week?
Jailed prisoners get treated better than that.
COVID 19 virus particle size is 125 nanometers (0.125 microns); the range is 0.06 microns to .14 microns. The N95 mask filters down to 0.3 microns. So, N95 masks block few, if any, virions (virus particles).
In other words, the virus is smaller than the filter on the N95 mask, so the N95 mask doesn’t work.
The only “spike” is from the spike proteins that All of the vaccinated are Shedding.
Totally nuts. We know that masks do little or nothing regarding blocking “the virus”. It is mainly for subjugation of the masses to keep them in fear. Over the centuries viruses have come and gone. Few pandemics have been used to control the masses.
They dress up the common cold to look like something death causing and sure if someone has a very weak immune system as in the past they might need to be in “isolation” for a while to recover. They didn’t call it quarantine because that sounds scary and government controlling. Remember?
It’s been about control. The government causing fear for control. Remember the government exists to serve us not for we to serve the government. Isn’t it obvious?
Over the years I’ve suggested people try this little exercise: sit in a chair with eyes closed and imagine you are looking down at the ground then move up through the clouds, still looking back at earth and into space until the earth is a tiny dot in the sky. Now how important is everything on earth?
The Omnivore variant (likes vaccinated and unvaccinated people) does not appear to be nearly so dangerous as the variant which only killied .01% (that’s 1 in 10,000 for public school graduates). Sounds as if it spreads so readily that masks so little good.
But here is my question: Has OSHA done away with their requirements for a respirator physical before employees wear on the job? I used to have one of those physicals every two years. You need to be in good shape to pass one. My guess is that half of those teachers are not fit enough to pass. Then what?
Yes chuckie…the requirement is still in effect. We have to get fitted and do the lung test annually but no physical.
Sorry chuckie…guess I missed the teacher part. What I said is true however OSHA waived the fit test requirements for emergency use during pandemic.
Abolish teachers unions.
We also need to seriously examine how teachers are hired. There are far, far too many selfish people teaching kids on the public tax dollar that think they’re an executive of a private company.
Teachers work for us. If they don’t want to do their job, NEXT.
What a gross generalization Bruh! I work in a large school district and my observation is that there are far too many SELFLESS people teaching kids, being paid very little, and answering to overindulged parents who are raising overindulged children. My daughter is an elementary school teacher. She loves her job; she loves her students; and there is no part of her that believes she is an “executive of a private company.” She knows quite clearly that she answers to parents, administrators, and people like you (at all hours of the day and night). Much like in any profession, there are lazy, ill-equipped employees, but let’s try and support this profession for those who are passionate and who literally sacrifice to educate our children.
@PL I’ll generalize all I want. I have zero sympathy for these teachers.
I have not missed going in to 1 day of work since all the covid stuff started so I’ll not hear any excuses for teachers.
@PL I also personally know 3 teachers. Two are very selfish and have supported the shutdowns and remote learning because it makes their life easier teaching from home and gives extra time off, as seen from their various trips during all the shutdowns.
The other teacher never supported the shutdowns from day 1, but he is clearly the minority in a sea full of selfish teachers shutting the schools down and making the children mental health crisis worse so they can travel and do whatever they want. Just from my own personal experience he is outnumbered 2:1 and I know from talking to him that a vast majority of the teachers in his union support all of this.
As I said, zero sympathy and I know a good teacher but he’s the exception to the rule.
Like I said, there are lazy, ill-equipped employees in every profession. It’s too bad that of the THREE teachers you know, 2/3 of them appear to be of this caliber. I too have witnessed some bad behaviors since working with hundreds of teachers, and I’ve had three daughters go through the school systems. I would challenge you and say that a greater majority of the teachers are dedicated, but struggling during this time of unknown circumstances. Not one teacher I know enjoys what’s going on right now and very few can afford to “travel and do whatever they want”. Have you seen their salaries?
When you put apples in a drum for winter storage, if one apple is starting to go bad it will spoil the whole drum of apples. This is true for teachers. It’s unfortunate, but everyone let it happen. Teachers have zero morals and are held hostage by their union. This is the truth.
Unfortunately PL has the burden of proof when it comes to who these selfless individuals are. I know what a teacher makes, it ain’t to shabby.
I’m going to say it again for the people in the back, these are public employees and are accountable to the taxpayers.
@PL
The fact is, these teachers are responsible for the mental health crisis that is going on with these kids that will not be felt by society for 10-15 years and will last for these kids entire lives and the ones responsible for inflicting this trauma will be the teachers, their unions, and their politician supporters. The trauma caused by those 3 entities will mean the rest of society as a whole will suffer from the fallout in the coming years.
Not only are teachers and their allies causing trauma they are collecting taxes for a service they are not providing. That is fraud, theft, and unethical.
You are part of the school system and so is your daughter so I don’t see us going much further in this discussion since you are in a naturally defensive position. I’ve said what I said feel free to respond and I’ll read it but I will not respond myself. I know where I stand and it’s not budging.
I understand your perspectives. Maybe in trying to get you to see my point of view, I was appearing to lump all teachers into one basket. After a night to think about my quick and admittedly defensive response, I thought it important to clearly and thoughtfully state where I am coming from. I absolutely agree that there are many teachers out there that are lazy, negative, and frankly an embarrassment to the profession. And, as Sam put it, are spoiling the bunch. What I’m hoping is that people will see that there are many young, energetic, passionate teachers, early in their careers, who are reading comments such as yours and are already defeated and questioning their futures. We need good teachers! We’ve needed an overhaul for a long time and as a society, we need to encourage our young teachers to continue to pursue their careers and make a difference. I know, in this discussion, I hold the burden to prove you both wrong. Right now, I can’t do that because unfortunately, you’re right in a lot of ways. What I will ask is that you remember the teachers who aren’t selfish, lazy, fraudulent, lacking morals… I promise you, they’re out there and they’re reading your comments. We need to be part of the solution and encourage our young (and more seasoned) teachers to think for themselves and educate our youth, in spite of the noise and distractions.
The young teachers reading these comments need to see them. If they don’t hear how others have really messed things up then won’t do anything different. I’m positive you are correct, as not every single teacher is scum. Like I said, unfortunately this has become the norm rather the exception. Again, these are public employees and are accountable to the taxpayers. They have no business indoctrinating the youth in their or their unions political agenda. Schools should be a place of education, kids should be taught how to think not what to think.
These “stop the spread” procedures for testing and isolation may once have made some sense, but they don’t make sense in an environment when all the adults are vaccinated (and many are also post-infection) and a milder, very contagious variant is everywhere. People without symptoms should go to work, and that’s it. *You aren’t going to stop the spread*, you’re just crippling your basic operations by having too many staff out at once.
Doubling down after an approach fails to make sense – that’s the name of the game for bureaucracies. That’s why we have crazy sauce like people putting preschoolers in supposed KN-95 masks – which every single expert (and non-expert) would have derided as ludicrous and potentially dangerous in the pre-Covid-insanity era. These institutions just can’t step back and realize that the path they’ve gone down is no longer leading anywhere. They can’t stop the spread, but they *can* make people’s lives miserable and ruin kids’ educations and social development and happiness by doubling down.
“Vaccination no longer preventing spread?! It’s okay, we’ll just mandate boosters every 5 months, no every 4 months, let’s say every 3 months, for every person down to infants! Then the strategy will work! Expert committee approval – what’s that? We can just bypass that and tell the FDA what to do.”
“Masks manifestly not doing anything?! It’s okay, we’ll just pretend that little kids can wear sealed respirator masks all day! Then the strategy will work! At least no one can say we didn’t try hard enough, which is what really matters, not whether the measures actually do anything at all.”
Once the whole machinery of our government/media/education culture decided that stopping the spread (rather than reducing serious illness/death) was *the only* legitimate goal, and that vaccination and masking were the efficacious tools to that end, they locked themselves into a pattern they can’t get out of. They need help. They need the people to simply not comply with restrictive measures. Measures that are manifestly failing to do anything except ruin people’s lives, going into year three.
Thank you, Led, for your commentary and seeing the whole picture while the powers that be are stuck in tunnel vision! They have reached a ‘point of no return’ and it is up to We the People to exhibit civil disobedience….
+1,000 to Led’s post!
My KN mask goes to 11.
Why buy Chinese masks with a Chinese standard, giving money to the country which wantonly and knowingly covered up first and thereafter intentionally spread the Wuhan Coronavirus?
You can get KF94 masks from Korea for a dollar a unit if you buy 50 units from reputable sellers. A government buying millions could probably get them for half a dollar or less. Why give CHINA a single cent instead of giving the money to our allies???
True, but thats not the salient point here.
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