Wellsville BOE urged to demand masks | News, Sports, Jobs

WELLSVILLE – As surrounding local school districts implement mask mandates due to the COVID count, a parent in the village urged members of the Wellsville Board of Education to follow their lead.

Due to the increase in positive COVID-19 cases and the number of quarantines, East Liverpool began requiring face coverings in their buildings from September 15. Earlier last week, Governor Mike DeWine pointed to escalating cases of COVID among school-aged children.

Before the start of the school year, the authorities opened up possibilities of vaccination against COVID for children 12 years and older, by order of the parents.

At Monday’s meeting, Daniel Winston highlighted the increase in the number of students testing positive for COVID or quarantined by exposure as a reason to change Wellsville’s policy to impose masks. In August, Wellsville board members decided to follow guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and the Ohio Department of Health by simply recommending face coverings in opposition to Superintendent Richard Bereschik’s support for a mask warrant.

Bereschik believed the masks would improve the district’s chances of sustaining in-person learning, especially if the district pursued all other mitigation measures, like social distancing and its disinfection stations. Face coverings on Wellsville buses are already mandatory.

Winston explained that recently 100 students were quarantined due to possible exposure to COVID, according to a general call.

“As a village, I hope we can get together”, he explained, adding that today’s figures are now the same as in November 2020.

The board members also hired the following people: Valentina Gheorghe; Rachel Beth Engle; Derrick Suggs and Tera Kazee, short-term paraprofessionals at Garfield Elementary School; alternates Linda Lonkert, Sheila McCoy Bachmeier, Mark Jones, Justin Talbert, Karen Kelly, Linda Frischkorn; and Courtney Kountz as a high school orchestra volunteer.

Austin Dalrymple has been chosen as the delegate to attend the Ohio School Boards Association’s capital conference and John Morrow is the alternate.

Board member Richard Salsberry also offered his condolences on behalf of the board to the families and friends of Edison’s local school teacher Todd Smith and former East School Board member Liverpool, Dick Wolf.

The next regular board meeting is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. on October 18 at the Wellsville Junior-Senior High School Media Center.