Supt. Kudlak reverses: Now preK-6th grade students must mask

At the Aug. 23 meeting of the Van Buren Public Schools Board of Education, School Supt. Pete Kudlak said a little over two weeks ago he announced that masks would be optional in the schools and now just two hours earlier he sent out a letter reversing that for the younger students.
He now mandates masks for students in pre-Kindergarten through sixth grade.
He said now the state and Wayne County have more positive COVID cases and the district has more positive cases. He said they will still monitor and report cases on the website, once school is up and running.
In his letter, he told parents, “In the past two weeks, our local area has moved from Moderate Transmission to Substantial Transmission. Based on these discussions, we will be starting the year mandating masks in Preschool through 6th Grade for students while they are indoors. Masks are Strongly Recommended in grades 7-12. We have an estimate of 45%-50% of 12-18-year-olds in our community having at least one dose of the vaccine.”
At the meeting Supt. Kudlak said the superintendents are the educational leaders for the 33 districts in Wayne County and the public health issues should be above politics.
He said the health leaders are saying to the educators, “We’re strongly recommending that you mandate…”
“That’s ridiculous,” he said.
He said the educators listen to the health experts and, “We’re not health experts.”
“It’s atrocious that that the health departments from the state on down put the responsibility on us,” said board president Amy Pearce. “You didn’t go to med school,” she said to Supt. Kudlak, who is charged with making the health decisions for the district.
At the end of the meeting, board secretary Darlene Gerick said the district will make decisions based on the current situation. She reminded those at the meeting, “We pivoted a lot last year.”
In other business at Monday’s meeting, the board:
• Unanimously approved the only bid for fresh-made pizzas for the 2021-22 school year from Happy’s Pizza of Belleville at $10 per pizza. Last year’s pizza contract with Marco’s was $8 per pizza. The 14” pizzas with eight slices each must follow the federal mandates for school lunches. A total of more than 400 pizzas are delivered each week to the high school, middle school and intermediate school on separate days and to two elementary schools per week on Thursdays. Board president Pearce said they bought 50-100 pizzas for the band recently and they paid just $6 each;
• Was informed by Plante Moran Cresa’s Rob Kakoczki of the project team’s recommendation to grant the $37,500 fixed fee agreement to Foresite Design of Berkley for athletic design services for turf replacement and track reconditioning at Belleville High School. The football field and track are about nine years old. Two firms bid on the design. The agreement is expected to come up to a vote at the board’s next meeting and then Foresite will prepare construction specifications for bids, with upgrades determined by the district. Foresite estimates the total project costs in the summer of 2022 to be about $665,000;
• Heard a quarterly update from Kakoczki of Plante Moran Cresa on the 2019 bond projects and their progress. Among the many bits of information presented was that the Early Childhood Development Center is expected to be pretty much completed in September. It is due to open for the second semester. He said they are hopeful Davis Street paving will be done before September;
• Approved the terminations of the following teachers as of Aug. 30: Dion Holmes from Belleville High School, after eight years of service, for a job opportunity; Vikki Kasperek from Edgemont, after four years of service, for a job opportunity; Shannon Farnell of Tyler, after three years of service, for a job opportunity; Amy Morning of Tyler, after eight years of service, for a job opportunity; Anastazia Wyborski of BHS after three years of service, with no reason given; and Rebecca Chinn of BHS after five years of service, for a job opportunity. Also: Melanie Prince of Owen after less than a year of service as of Aug. 18 with no reason given; Noah Silveri of BHS after less than a year of service as of Aug. 19 for personal reasons; Emily Mills of BHS after one year of service as of Aug. 23 for personal reasons; Bodrick Martin of BHS after less than one year of service as of Aug. 23 for a job opportunity; and Sarah Brown of Edgemont after six years of service as of Aug. 23 for a job opportunity;
• Approved hiring the following teachers as of Aug. 25: Nicole Gandolfo-Sherman for Tyler; Andrew Palmer, Victoria Lindenfeld, Laurence Williams (social worker), Sarah Flaim, and Joseph Gaines at BHS; and Justin Bogrow for Owen;
• Approved the retirement of bus driver Debora Smith on Aug. 12 after 28 years of service; also, approved the termination of custodian Lisa Gilbert after less than one year of service on Aug. 5 when she quit;
• Approved hiring non-instructional employees: Audrey Rappe, Rachel Meyer, and Benjamin Joseph as paraprofessionals in Student Services; Renea Kurek as instructional support specialist at the administration building; Constance McKenzie as paraprofessional at Edgemont; Danika Cavins-Mason and Mariha Campbell, as paraprofessionals as sites yet to be determined; Denise Adkins and Crisandra Welch as bus drivers; Sara Pittman in food service at Owen; and Reginald Williams at student safety liaison at BHS;
• Heard Ginny Gearns say she attended a local meeting with State Rep. Puri earlier that day and they talked about how to get mask mandates for young students. She said the governor passed off the decision to the school districts. She said Rep. Puri said that maybe Wayne County Health Department in the next week will mandate masks for all Wayne County students. She is concerned about her grandchildren and supports masks for young students. Supt. Kudlak said he sent out a letter two hours earlier that mandates masks for students in grades preK-6;
• Heard Shawn Phenix, father of a seven-year-old Gifted and Talented student at Savage Elementary, say he has been a certified teacher since 2008. He said Supt. Kudlak was being inconsistent with making the mask mandatory for only the younger students. He called for a permanent mandate for all the students. He said there is no other reasonable way to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. “Heavy is the burden that lies on your shoulders,” he said to Kudlak. “I don’t envy you.” He said he wouldn’t want it on his conscience being responsible for putting a child on a ventilator;
• Heard Tracee Harris Kloian say she has been a teacher for 22 years and she teaches special education. She said she can’t teach them without them seeing her face. “I got Pfizer, but I got COVID,” she said, adding people have to stop being afraid. “We’ve got to get busy living,” she said, adding choice and freedom is what people need. She said COVID will be here forever;
• Heard Peggy Zachrey said she has had COVID and the vaccine compromises the immune system. “I pray every day for our country,” she said. “This will go on forever”;
• During board comments, thanked the people for coming forward and voicing their concerns; and
• Went into closed door session at the end of the meeting to consider potential reinstatement of a student for the 2021-22 school year. The student was expelled during the 2019-20 school year. After discussion, the board came back to open session and reinstated student 19-20-013 without conditions.