Elmhurst School Denies Mask Noncompliance

ELMHURST, IL — The leader of Timothy Christian Schools in Elmhurst said this week that the school was going mask optional, despite the governor's school mask mandate. Now, the school says it never intended to be noncompliant.

On social media, defenders of Elmhurst's Timothy Christian Schools have taken Patch to task for a headline about the school leader's public statement on its mask policy. They said the headline, "This Elmhurst School Going Mask Optional," was false and misleading.

On Wednesday, the state pulled its recognition of Timothy shortly after school Superintendent Matt Davidson spoke about masks in a video. The state said Davidson would not affirm that his school would follow the governor's mask mandate for public and private schools.

In a news release Thursday, Timothy said it "never announced that it would be noncompliant." Its lawyer, Vanessa Clohessy, in a letter to the Illinois State Board of Education, said, "Timothy Christian Schools never communicated its intent to be non-compliant with the Order."

But Davidson's words in the video indicated a policy contrary to the governor's order.

"We've determined that our goal is to stick with the Timothy health plan and thus remain mask optional," he said.

Davidson has not returned a call for comment. A school spokeswoman said Thursday he was unavailable for an interview.

Timothy's students return to class Aug. 25.

Patch is publishing the first few minutes of Davidson's video statement. Much of the rest of the statement is about Davidson's appeal for unity and rejection of hatred, which is covered in Patch's first story on the video.

Here's what Davidson said:

After several nights to sleep on it and a productive exchange of ideas and plenty of prayer, the board and I have taken the necessary time to respond rather that react to the press conference by the governor last Wednesday. We've taken a prayerful and very methodical approach. We've determined that our goal is to stick with the Timothy health plan and thus remain mask optional.

Now, keep listening, please. This is really important. This isn't an act of defiance. We aren't puffing our chest out. We're not ramping up for some big fight. Speaking personally, I'm not comfortable with that approach, and I wouldn't support it. We're not trying to make any statement. We're simply going to explore this further for the next few weeks, maybe longer. But we are going to turn over every stone. We're going to observe what happens over the next few weeks on this issue as most schools start before us. But ultimately, we are going to reach a conclusion on the legality of the announcement from the governor, especially as a private, faith-based religious educational institution.

Of course, well keep you informed. Until then, our health plan is still in place, and I believe it can stay that way. Folks, we believe our health plan can continue to work. It's worked all summer with hundreds of children on campus with summer school and camps. It's a plan we've all known about since early June. There are thousands of schools nationwide, public and private, that are starting school with mask optional policies and health plans very similar to ours. We're members of a council that is made of the top Christian schools in the country. In a recent survey on this topic, 100 percent of the surveyed participating schools in this council are going mask optional this fall.

Our data here at Timothy supports the effectiveness and success of our health plan, along with data from other schools. We also receive reports on local data and that can inform any changes to our plan. And it's worth pointing out, it's worth noting, that the issue of masks in schools is still categorically a recommendation and not a requirement from the CDC. We're fully committed to the health of our students. And that includes the whole child, physical health, spiritual health, mental. We're one of the very few large K-12 schools in all of Chicagoland to be fully in person last year. And there were doubters every step of the way.

We want to find out legally, definitively, if we can keep our health plan in place. Folks, we have worked too hard and achieved too much success to just roll over. I've heard of some sneaky workarounds on this issue, being proposed all across Illinois. Desperation will always give birth to change, good or bad. I'm not judging or evaluating any plan or end game by any school or parent. But I hope you can respect that we are addressing this directly head on. We have nothing to hide.

At the end of our exploration, our research, if we discover that a mask optional policy is a dead end, we will adjust and pivot. But for now, our current health plan will be our manual, which allows for choice on the issue of face coverings.

At this time and on this matter, I would not support outright defiance of a rule that we have discovered to be valid, applicable, enforceable to our school and upheld as legal. But in the meantime, we're curious enough to find out. We will keep our health plan as is while we think we can do so.