To answer those questions, it must first be considered that there are several possible aims of any policy addressing whether children should wear masks in schools. Those goals could include the protection of immune-compromised people; reaching zero infections, zero deaths or even reducing transmission of other respiratory pathogens — and achieving these aims might require indefinite mask mandates. But if any of these are part of a school’s rationale, its leaders need to say it clearly and have an open discussion about the pros and the cons.

Any organization setting a mask mandate at this point in the pandemic in the United States must pair that mandate with an “off ramp” plan. Sleepwalking into indefinite masking is not in anyone’s interests and can increase distrust after an already very difficult year.

What if the stated goal is simply, “Kids need to be in school, period.” Considering the devastating costs of having children out of school last year, including dramatic and quantifiable learning loss in math and reading, this is a very reasonable and defensible goal. How might that then drive policy? Setting that goal would mean deploying more tools to keep children in school, like using rapid antigen tests and allowing kids who test negative to go to in-person class rather than mass quarantining hundreds or thousands of children who had close contact to people with the virus, as is happening now. Or, we accept that there will be more cases in children, recognizing that disease severity for a vast majority of kids is low.