On February 25, the CDC announced the COVID-19 Community Levels Tool to serve as a new framework for COVID-19 monitoring and prevention strategies. This guidance is recommended for all communities, including school, childcare, and other settings where children participate, to use in determining when to apply mitigation practices. The CDC’s K-12 guidance webpage has been updated to link to the new Community Levels guidance. Note that these changes do not interfere with the discretion of schools, childcare, and other youth settings to require masks in some or all situations.
One additional change to note is that effective February 25, 2022, CDC will not enforce its order requiring masks on certain transportation conveyances against buses or vans operated by public or private school systems, including early care and education/childcare programs. Even though they won’t be required, the CDC continues to recommend masks for these transportation operators and passengers in some situations, based on the individual and community risk considerations in the above framework. Additional information can be found on the CDC website.