Masks will no longer be required in K-12 Brunswick schools beginning on March 14.

The Brunswick School Board on Wednesday voted unanimously to drop its policy of mandatory masking after reviewing the state’s updated, mask-optional guidance for schools and the district’s declining COVID-19 case rate.

The school’s medical team — made up of five registered nurses and one physician — was not present but provided a statement suggesting the district adopt the updated state guidelines: “Per the latest SOP revision, we recommend allowing staff and students/families to choose if they want to wear mask beginning March 14, 2022,” the statement read in part. “We recommend all other health and safety practices remain in place. We further recommend that we review specific events, trips, etc. to determine if they warrant additional safety measures.”

Masks will still be required in Brunswick’s Pre-Kindergarten program, an alteration to the school medical team’s recommendation that the board passed 6-3 after requesting more information on how removing masks would impact the district’s youngest population that is not eligible for COVID-19 vaccination.

The school board plans to revisit the decision on pre-K on March 23.

At Wednesday’s meeting, one parent spoke, Curt Lyford, who asked for the mask mandate to continue in pre-K to avoid placing the decision on his four-year-old daughter.

“I’m for keeping masks mandate for pre-K, the reason being that the pre-K students are the only cohort in our school that do not have the option of getting a vaccine,” Lyford said, adding “It’s hard for me to say, ‘okay, the data says you probably won’t get it, and if you get it, and you’re a child, it probably won’t be bad’ – but what if it is for my kid? Right, what if I’m the one time that happens and she has problems for the rest of her life.”

On Thursday, Brunswick parent Lori Allen said she was glad pre-K will stay masked for now, although remains baffled at removing the mask mandate otherwise.

“We have had a couple of situations this year where my daughter was exposed on the bus (with older kids), and there were a couple of times when someone in her pool tested positive. She has always tested negative, and I believe that is because of masking,” Allen wrote in an email. “I know the risks are low, but masking feels like a small price to pay for a bit of peace of mind.”

According to Brunswick Area Teen Center Coordinator Jordan Cardone, the free after-school program for grades 6-12 has been following school protocol and masks will now also be optional at the teen center. Cardone said she feels both elation and trepidation about this, and plans to proceed with caution.

“It will be wonderful to see everyone’s faces again after two years behind masks and not have to spend most of our time with the kids monitoring and admonishing improper masking which has affected/changed our role as staff and has only gotten worse as the kids have felt ‘so done’ with having to wear masks for quite a while now,” Cardone said.

Cardone said masks will still be readily available, and all other measures like watching for symptoms, air filtration and hand sanitizing will continue.

Board members also discussed Wednesday how to address bullying in schools as it relates to masks. According to Brunswick Assistant Superintendent Shawn Lambert, schools throughout Maine are going to struggle with it, and there is no easy answer.

“Unfortunately, like the rest of society, this is going to have some flashpoints. You can go to Hannaford, or anywhere, and ask people’s opinions and you’re going to have very few people in the middle, you’re going to have a lot of people on either side, and the challenge is to have a civil conversation, or to actually tolerate and embrace other people’s decisions. Well, that’s not going to be any different in schools,” Lambert said.

Ultimately, Lambert said that staff will be instructed to respond to incidents of bullying, and reiterate to students that “it is just a choice” and that “there is nothing wrong with wearing a mask or not wearing a mask.”

According to Lambert, Brunswick school staff is not able to enforce a parent’s wish that a student wears a mask.

Since the start of the 2021-22 school year, as of Thursday, 710 cases of COVID-19 have been reported throughout the Brunswick School Department.

Of those, 12 active positive cases were being reported as of Thursday.

Other Midcoast school districts to take steps towards mask-optional include Freeport-area Regional School Unit 5, Bath-area Regional School Unit 1 and Topsham-area MSAD 75. Portland public schools will also switch to mask-optional beginning Monday.