After a school board meeting on March 2, Austin ISD has updated its protocols and is going mask-optional starting Monday, March 7.

Anticipating a strong reaction from members of the Austin ISD community, Superintendent Stephanize Elizalide said she hopes that everyone will respect the personal decisions people make on Monday about wearing or not wearing masks.

“Let us all support each other, masked or unmasked,” she said on the district’s Twitter account.

The change in the district’s requirement for all students and staff to wear masks, which it has had since the beginning of the school year, has brought out differences of opinion across the Akins community.

Senior Rhiannon Ferguson said that she thinks the district made the change too fast, considering that the Austin-Travis County Public Health Authority just announced on Tuesday that Austin is in Stage 3 of the county’s risk-based guidelines.

Dr. Desmar Walkes told the Austin-American Statesman this week that she still recommends people wear masks indoors considering that Spring Break and the Austin-based South by Southwest conference will bring thousands of people to the area.

“We just got into Stage 3 a few days ago and they’re already changing it,” Ferguson said. “I feel like, obviously, if we’re not all wearing masks all the time, then the COVID cases are just going to go up again. It’s not going to just stay in Stage 3 and go down forever, ” she said.

She said she’s concerned about COVID spread at Akins after people returning from traveling during spring break.

“They really should have waited until after spring break to see what would happen, but they didn’t,” Ferguson said.

She said that she hopes students and teachers will respect each other’s personal decisions about wearing a mask.

“I feel like less mature kids are gonna joke around and bully kids that are still wearing their masks,” Ferguson said.

Senior Danny Avita said that he is indifferent to the mask policy change.

“I don’t think it’s a good or bad idea. I mean, COVID rates are kind of going down, so I don’t think there’s a purpose to it anymore,” he said.

He said that he thinks there’s going to be a lot of mixed reactions when the mask policy change goes into effect next week.

“I think a lot of people are going to come to school without their masks. And I feel like a lot of people are going to complain about there not being a mask policy,” Avita said.

Junior Yahir Alpizar said that he thinks wearing a mask on campus should still be mandatory.

“I think it’s a stupid decision. COVID is still a fast-spreading virus and I think it’s dumb that they’re making it optional,” he said.

He said that he doesn’t think it’s the right time to make masks optional.

“They see cases drop a little bit and then they think it should be optional,” he said.

Assistant Band Director Jose Flores said that he thinks the policy change “came out of nowhere.”

“I think it is abrupt. I feel about I feel that way about the CDC as well,” Flore said. “And the statistics are not necessarily true because they’re cherry-picked to look good. And people might not physically report or be diagnosed with COVID but they may be carrying it and have no idea and then they might expose somebody who is at greater risk.”

He said that he doesn’t necessarily think that it was the right time to change the mask policy because “people are still at risk.”

“The numbers say there was a 97 percent reduction in cases in the past six weeks, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s eradicated. It’s still around. I think that the reason why it’s dropped 97 percent, is because people wear their masks,” he said.

He also said he’s concerned about people traveling after returning from spring break.

“That’s what happened after winter break. I was missing half of my class. I have 40 kids in my first class and I had 10 kids show up,” he said.

Austin ISD officials are recommending that people who are concerned about becoming infected with COVID-19 should wear the N95 masks the district is providing for free to students.

Flores said that he doesn’t think people will enhance the quality of their masks.

“I think that people are just going to do what they’ve been doing,” he said. “You should think about the people that you are saving. You should think about the people that you’re saving rather than your mild discomfort,” he said.

Math teacher Peter Gutierrez said that he understands why everyone is still scared, but it would be hard for the district not to follow CDC guidelines.

He said that he thinks it might be difficult for students and teachers to respect each other’s personal decisions about wearing masks.

“I feel like if you’re on one end of the spectrum, I feel like it’s just going to be very hard for you not to act or treat someone differently even though you’re trying not to. But I think it’ll just take some work from both sides to do that,” Gutierrez said.

Superintendent Elizalde said in a tweet that the district will continue to abide by the CDC’s recommendations.

“As always, please keep in mind that the fluidity of this pandemic may require that we reinstate a masking requirement,” she said on Twitter.

Izaak Mireles, Natalie Rodriguez, and Xander Musgrave contributed to this story.