{"id":45392,"date":"2021-08-04T22:58:00","date_gmt":"2021-08-04T22:58:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/dolores-schools-will-require-students-and-teachers-to-carry-masks-offer-leniency-with-wearing-them\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T09:24:49","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:24:49","slug":"dolores-schools-will-require-students-and-teachers-to-carry-masks-offer-leniency-with-wearing-them","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/dolores-schools-will-require-students-and-teachers-to-carry-masks-offer-leniency-with-wearing-them\/","title":{"rendered":"Dolores schools will require students and teachers to carry masks, offer leniency with wearing them"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Test
Test scores at Dolores Elementary have improved dramatically since 2017.<\/span>The Journal file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

Dolores schools will require students and teachers to carry facial masks this school year, but will not require them to wear masks outside or in uncrowded areas, said Interim Superintendent Reece Blincoe.<\/p>\n

Students will not have to wear them while sitting at their desks.<\/p>\n

Dolores School District RE-4A will have a staggered start to the 2021-22 school year. Most students start class Aug. 16, and seventh and eight graders will start Aug. 17-18.<\/p>\n

Blincoe said he plans to address the mask rules Monday at the 2021-22 school year convocation.<\/p>\n

The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment on Friday endorsed the Center for Disease Control and Prevention\u2019s recommendation that everyone in a school setting wear a mask. School districts are free to construct their own pandemic procedures.<\/p>\n

Dolores students will be encouraged to take their masks off and get fresh air at recess, Blincoe said.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor sure, outside masks will be taken off,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s beautiful Colorado \u2014 we\u2019ve got some good fresh air.\u201d<\/p>\n

Teachers will be required to wear masks when entering a classroom or any other crowded setting, he said. As they teach in front of the classroom, about 10 feet from the students, they may remove their masks.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost everything we\u2019re going to do is going to be recommended,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Bus drivers and riders will be required to wear masks, in accordance with the U.S. Department of Transportation\u2019s federal mandate requiring the masking of travelers.<\/p>\n

Food service workers also will be outfitted with masks and gloves.<\/p>\n

Parents will only be allowed inside a school building in rare circumstances, he said.<\/p>\n

Blincoe noted that the district reserves the right to alter pandemic protocol at any time.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re starting the year a little lighter than I would probably do it,\u201d he said, speaking of the preventative measures.<\/p>\n

Mandatory masks will become the new normal if cases surge, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to be doing a lot of monitoring,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The district\u2019s website contains health screening forms<\/a> required to be completed by staff before the start of every school day.<\/p>\n

Hannah-Nyibol Deng Bior, a special education teacher in Dolores, previously told The Journal<\/em> she wasn\u2019t sure whether masks would be required in her district.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Everyone will be required to carry masks, but they will not have to be worn at all times, said Interim Superintendent Reece Blincoe. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":45393,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[685,44,103,155,28,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-45392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-coronavirus-covid-19","tag-dolores","tag-dolores-schools-re-4a","tag-education","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45392"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45392\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":86477,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45392\/revisions\/86477"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45393"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45392"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=45392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}