(Mark Pellin, Headline USA) The authoritarian bureaucrats at Loudon County Public Schools are continuing their penchant for creating a toxic and divisive learning environment for students.
The latest example comes with the schools’ policy to issue immediate suspensions for any student who doesn’t comply with an overbearing mask mandate.
The edict, effective Feb. 2, was announced to students gathered in an assembly last month, according to the Epoch Times.
“You have all chosen not to wear a mask this week,” William Shipp, principal of Woodgrove High School, admonished unmasked students who had been herded into the gym. “Essentially, that is just defiant of the rules Loudoun County Public Schools have put up.”
Students were told they would face immediate suspension if they showed up unmasked for classes and that the punishment would extend until the offender complied and started wearing a mask. The school would provide an appeals process, and during the suspension students could continue with virtual learning.
It quickly became apparent, however, that the mask mandate has much more to do with enforcing blind compliance to tyrannical bureaucrats than it does with healthcare or COVID abatement.
As a way to skirt Virginia’s official guidance for COVID prevention in schools that leaves the decision of masking and vaccination up to parents, implemented under new Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin, Loudoun County schools officials claim that the suspensions are not for refusing to mask, but for “disobedience” and “defiance,” according to letters sent to parents.
Loudoun County is one of the districts in the state that have refused to drop the mask mandate, despite Youngkin’s executive order that gave the masking decision to parents, reported Epoch Times. Virginia has more than 130 school districts, with about 50 following the same course as Loudoun County.
“A student who is suspended because of non-compliance with COVID-mitigation measures may return to school only when they agree to follow COVID-mitigation measures throughout the entire school day and at all indoor school-related events,” reads a letter to Harmony Middle School parents. “Suspension will continue if COVID-mitigation measures are not followed.”
That type of dictatorial enforcement is having a devastating impact on students, as is the public shaming that school authorities are promoting.
Unmasked students are made to enter the school through the main entrance and walk past masked students in the morning to go to their separate location, reported Epoch Times.
When the school day is complete, unmasked students have to use a back door to exit the school several minutes earlier than masked students.
“Every day felt like a prison,” said one Woodgrove High student. “Each day gets crazier and crazier.”
