Ithaca, NY school enforces masks outdoors, COVID measures

The federal government says the COVID is over — but tell that to this upstate New York school.

A private school in Ithaca is still forcing draconian measures on its students, including making them wear masks outdoors and eat lunch in silence — three years after the pandemic began, according to a report.

The Elizabeth Ann Clune Montessori School of Ithaca (EACMSI), which costs up to $18,000 a year to attend, is currently one of the last schools in the nation to still be imposing such strict COVID measures, The Free Press reported.

Dr. Beth Stein, who pulled her kids out of EACMSI and put them in private school because of the strict measures, told The Free Press she initially welcomed the precautions, but they became overly burdensome as time went on.

“I could tolerate most of the stuff — the teachers in N95s and face shields while standing behind plexiglass barriers, the 12 feet of distance for band members, the ban on singing ‘Happy Birthday’ in class,” she said. “I just wanted them to end the outdoor masking.”

The board-certified doctor also claimed her students were almost kicked out of the school after she complained about outdoor masking.

The school doesn’t have a cafeteria and students eat lunch in their classrooms.

Stein said some days her 13-year-old daughter’s teacher would play movies during lunch, but on other days they ate in complete silence. If a student dared to ask their teacher a question during lunch, the kid would first have to put on their mask in order to speak, and then could take it off again to go back to eating.

Sometimes, teachers took the mandated silent lunch as an opportunity to keep teaching, the mom said.

Stein’s 10-year-old daughter said kids in her class wanted so badly to converse during lunch that they invented their own sign language to communicate.

“We just really wanted to talk,” the girl said.

When EACMSI held a student orchestra performance indoors this January, students playing wind instruments were still required to wear masks, according to the report.

Parents had to figure out how to make or alter masks so their children could both play the instrument and have their faces covered.

“I see the current situation as ridiculous,” another parent, who wished to stay anonymous, told the outlet.

The school, which enrolls about 220 kids between ages 3 to about 14 or 15, says its “pedagogy is child-centered, hands-on, individualized, and serves the development of the whole child—physical, social, emotional, cognitive.” 

EACMSI’s policies go beyond the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines, which only recommend indoor masking in the nurse’s office or if a community has high rates of COVID.

CDC COVID guidelines for schools also currently recommend staying home when sick, improving ventilation in school buildings and encouraging students to stay up-to-date on vaccinations.

EACMSI said in a statement to The Free Press that “masking has been extremely effective in protecting our students and staff while they are on campus” and said the school had almost no on-campus transmission since reopening in the fall of 2020. It also said masks would be optional in the next academic year.