Students in the city’s public schools will be able to remove their masks outdoors starting next week, but will need to keep them on indoors for now, Schools Chancellor David Banks said Friday.
“I am very pleased to be able to make this exciting announcement and allow students and staff to remove their masks when outdoors in New York public schools,” said Banks.
The move comes at a time when COVID-19 infections in New York continue to decline after the appearance of the omicron variant caused a spike in December and January.
Mayor Eric Adams celebrated the revised mask rules in several television and radio appearances on Friday, but gave no deadline for lifting the indoor mask mandate in schools. “Over time, we’re going to go in place to ease a lot of these mandates so we can get back to a level of normalcy that we’re looking for,” Adams said on WPIX.
New York Governor Kathy Hochul said earlier this month that she would return to the issue of school mask rules in the first week of March.
Students in New York City and much of the rest of the state will return to classrooms Monday after a week off.
“Our schools continue to be one of the safest spaces for students and staff, thanks to our benchmark health and safety protocol. I am so glad we are able to make this exciting announcement and allow students and staff to remove their masks outdoors at @NYCschools,” the commissioner wrote in a social media post.
Our schools have remained some of the safest spaces for students & staff, thanks to our gold standard health & safety protocol. I’m so pleased that we are able to make this exciting announcement & safely allow students & staff to remove their masks when outdoors at @NYCschools. https://t.co/QzM8qlepHY
— Chancellor David C. Banks (@DOEChancellor) February 25, 2022
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