Opinion: Parents Know Best When It Comes To Masking

As Fairfield students get ready to attend school next week in a mask optional environment for the first time since March of 2020, many parents are breathing a sigh of relief. This should be a time to celebrate, however, parents still do not have the ultimate choice in what’s best for their child.

Parents were briefly given hope last week as Republican House members introduced amendment number 858 to House Bill 5047, which would have granted parents the ultimate choice on whether to mask their children in schools. The Democratic majority, including Cristin McCarthy Vahey, stifled that option, however. The resulting legislation ultimately preserved power for the state to override districts, and left some parents and children, including those in Bridgeport, still without a choice.

As a parent of two children in Fairfield Public Schools, I ask on behalf of all the families in our community why our representative, McCarthy Vahey, who voted against parental choice, believes that the state is more capable than parents in making this decision? Parents, not the state, know their children and their needs better than anyone.

As McCarthy Vahey begins to pivot to the pediatric mental health epidemic we now face, we must remind her that it was her votes for extended isolation, masked faces, removal of sports, and the destruction of educational dreams, which led us down this road.

Next week, many Fairfield kids will see the faces of their classmates and teachers for the first time in two years, while just miles away kids will continue to sit masked. At any point, the state can still mask our children, with no input from parents. We need representatives who will fight on a “never again” platform, for all of our children. We need our local representatives to represent us, as a community, and our interests. We need new leadership. It’s time to tell Hartford, parents know best.

Michael Grant

Connecticut House of Representatives District 133