A school district in California has removed its mask requirement for students after a four-year-old boy was filmed by his father being sent home from school because he wasn’t wearing a face covering.
Footage posted to YouTube shows the incident at the Theuerkauf Elementary School in the Mountain View Whisman School District in suburban San Francisco.
Principal Michelle Williams told the father in the video that “I welcome him here and I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again, I want him here but it is our district’s policy to have to wear a mask”.
The footage later shows what appears to be a police officer speaking to the father.
Speaking to ABC7, the father chose to only be named as Shawn. “I just think it’s time to move forward, the kids need to see faces, they need to see people smiling, they need to have a brighter outlook on the future in general,” he said.
He said he filmed the video to be able to share the interaction with fellow parents. He added that his son has developmental and sensory problems and struggles to keep his mask on.
“I’m watching my son. I’m waking him up every day to go to school, get turned away with tears in his eyes,” the father said. “He doesn’t know what’s going on, he’s visibly upset, visibly dishevelled by getting turned away and rejected.”
The father’s lawyer, Tracy Henderson of the California Parents Union, claimed that the school violated the law when they sent the child home.
“The school’s authority in a situation of public health issues, by law, is only to send a sick child home,” she told the local TV station.
Following the publication of the video, the school board changed the policy to make masking optional at a meeting on Thursday evening.
Superintendent Ayinde Rudolph said that “we are now in the medium tier, so starting tomorrow, we are now in ‘masks optional’ for students,” according to ABC7.
Dr Rudolph noted that 50 students and 12 members of staff have tested positive for Covid-19 in just the first five days of school.
Masks will still be mandatory on buses, at larger events and for those visiting schools.
“He basically looked like a PTSD victim,” Shawn told Fox. “He was inconsolable for about two hours.”
According to Fox News Digital, the boy attended class on Friday after the change in school policy.
Dr Rudolph said in a statement that he supports Principal Williams and the officer, adding that it was “very unfortunate” that Shawn chose to record the encounter despite Ms Williams requesting that he refrain from doing so on several occasions, according to Mountain View Voice.
“This parent worked with an advocacy group outside Mountain View to create a professional video in order to nationally shame a public servant doing her job while maintaining a safe and orderly school,” Dr Rudolph said.
“There’s so much nasty politics and dangerous rhetoric and ideologies out there. We’re bringing a target to our district when we do that,” board member Chris Chiang said during the meeting on Thursday, seemingly in reference to the video.
