By Dylan Warda ‘22

Anyone who enters Brother Rice’s building now has a choice of whether or not to wear a mask. As a student who’s three of my four years in high school were affected by the coronavirus, I can say I could not be happier.

I think masks should have been gone as soon as the vaccine became widely available. The vaccine is very effective in lowering the risk in getting and spreading the virus. The vaccine is more effective in protecting against the virus than masks ever were.

After wearing a mask for about a year and a half in school, it now feels weird to me not having anything to cover my face. I keep thinking that I should be feeling a mask on my face while in school, but as the days go on, it keeps feeling more normal again wearing no mask.

Sophomore Cale Cosme said, “It is good to see everyone breathing freely without a mask. I like seeing everyone’s faces again.”

Wearing masks was always annoying and wearing them all day in school was too much. I do not think they were good for us socially and hindered our ability to learn at times.

Senior Tom Verran said, “Wearing a mask all day would hurt my ears and make it harder to focus in class.”

Since masks are now our choice, some students continue to wear their masks. Masks are effective at stopping the spread of the coronavirus.

Senior Mike Helson said, “Better safe than sorry. I’m going to wear it for a couple weeks just in case removing the masks causes a resurgence.”

We will not know the consequences of removing masks until later because we have not done this before. Removing masks may or may not cause a spike in cases.

Having a choice of wearing masks is exciting to many. It feels great to finally free our faces!