Two years too late, but it's still progress, of a sort

now out of fashion

School Board will end face diaper mandate as of March 1st.

It’s an encouraging sign of the beginning of a return to sanity that the vote was unanimous, 8-0, but I’m a little worried about a question posed by the guy with four names regarding plexiglass shields:

School board member Michael-Joseph Mercanti-Anthony asked about other mitigation strategies, such as plexiglass barriers.

“There are some staff that feel safer with plexi[glass], and what’s really important is making sure that we keep our staff in school, that we keep our students in school,” Jones said.

Perhaps he was asking for a friend — I hope so, because if there’s anything more futile than Bob Saget donning earplugs to protect against a baseball bat, it’s wearing or hiding behind plexiglass to stop an aerosol, be it second-hand smoke or Wuhan Bat Flu particles. Teachers certainly shouldn’t be forbidden to use them: they’re timid little herd animals, easily panicked, and just as cowboys sing soothing lullabies to their charges, we should let the teachers ignore science if they wish, strip naked and paint themselves blue, or wear shields — whatever works to keep them girding their loins and entering the hazard zone each morning.

But … really?