NESPA Winner: Editorial, 2022

The Lancer Spirit, Londonderry High School, Londonderry, NH

Last week, about 100 community members congregated on the sidewalk in front of the school to protest the new mask mandate. Due to the concerning amount of positive cases in not only the school district, but the town in general, the school board decided at the Nov. 9 school board meeting to put our school into a universal mask mandate, with the end date yet to be determined.

This policy was put in place by the school board to coincide with what the NH State Department of Health Safety deemed a substantial spread of the COVID-19 virus.

The reasoning behind this decision was stated in an email Superintendent Scott Laliberte sent to families in the district on Nov. 11:

“The primary statistic that will be used to determine the use of universal masking will be the ‘Substantial Community Spread’ in the town of Londonderry, as indicated on the State Department of Public Health dashboard,” Laliberte said. “At present, that spread is in the ‘substantial’ range, which results in universal masking throughout the district.”

However, some people throughout town are less than pleased with the idea of the district requiring masks in the school buildings, as made clear by comments made during recent school board meetings. While this disruptive behavior is not anything new, we should not begin to normalize it.

Read the full story here.