Mask Requirements: 2021–2022

In fall 2020, with half of Americans fully vaccinated for COVID-19, the nation’s schools began the second pandemic school year open for in-person learning. Though school closures were largely a thing of the past, stubbornly high case rates shifted the political and geographic divisions over school pandemic responses to a new flashpoint: school district mask mandates.

Return to Learn’s 2021-22 Mask Mandate Tracking Data covered 8,500 districts. The data displayed on this page provide an overview of mask mandates’ timing across different types of school districts. Masking mandates and the problematic role of the CDC are reviewed in more depth here: “School Mask Mandates and CDC Guidance: 2021-22.”

Political differences in masking were stark. Before the CDC’s new guidance in February, 77 percent of students in school districts that voted for Biden attended schools with mask mandates, compared to 36 percent of students in Trump districts. The only masking predictor stronger than politics was in-person instructional offerings during the 2020-21 school year.

Learn more about this chart. | More information on variable definitions.

School districts’ masking policies were often misaligned with the CDC COVID-19 Community Risk Level. These charts highlight how districts were out of sync with the CDC’s updated masking guidance from February 2021.

Learn more about this chart. | This map is interactive – search, zoom in, and click on legend and variables for more information.

For the majority of the school year, school districts’ masking-policy decisions weren’t responsive to the COVID threat. During the delta and omicron waves, the vast majority of mask-optional districts were out of sync with that threat. This mismatch is highlighted in our interactive data site: “A Failure to Respond: Public School Mask Mandates in the 2021-22 School Year.”

Masking Policies During Most of the 2021-22 School Year Were Not Responsive to COVID-19 Case Numbers
Learn more about this chart.

Our goal is to provide a fundamental, up-to-date baseline of school districts’ current masking requirements and how they change during the 2021-22 school year. This tracker categorizes masking requirements for over 8,500 school districts nationwide, which include all regular public school districts with at least three schools. We hope these data will serve school communities as they face ongoing decisions, provide the basic knowledge necessary for shaping policy across states, and allow other researchers to more accurately study how COVID-19 mitigation efforts are impacting schools.

We adhere to high standards in research methodology and practices, pursuing rigorous transparency in our approach to this work.

Though this data collection is now closed, some districts may be misclassified. If you see a district you believe is mis-categorized, please submit a correction request here. Please find a thorough description of R2L methodology and data here.

About

These bar charts display the percentage of students in each category of mask requirements across weeks. Additionally, mask requirements are displayed for multiple district characteristics such as “Minority students”, in which high-minority districts are above the national district average and low-minority districts are above the average. For descriptions of all measures click on “More information on variable definitions.”

Adult Baccalaureate
Adult baccalaureate rates refer to the proportion of adults with bachelor’s degrees or higher in the county. High adult baccalaureate refers to districts in counties whose population averages adult baccalaureate rate was above the national average. Low adult baccalaureate refers to districts in counties with baccalaureate rates below the national average.
Source: Author’s calculations using R2L data and Educational Opportunity Project at Stanford University, 2021, https://edopportunity.org/

District Size
District size indicates the number of schools in a district. We defined small districts as those with three to five operational schools. Medium districts have between six and 11 operational schools. Lastly, large districts are defined as having 12 or more operational schools.
Source: Author’s calculations using R2L data and Common Core of Data, 2019, National Center for Education Statistics.

Mask Prevalence, Summer 2020
Mask usage was measured in summer of 2020 and indicates the estimated percentage of people within a county who would say “always” in response to the question “How often do you wear a mask in public when you expect to be within six feet of another person?” These data were collected from an online survey by the global data and survey firm Dynata at the request of The New York Times. Survey responses were collected between July 2 and July 14, 2020.
Source: Author’s calculations using R2L data and Mask Wearing Survey Data at the New York Times, 2020, https://github.com/nytimes/covid-19-data/tree/master/mask-use

Minority Students
High minority districts are those that have a higher percentage of non-white students than the national district average. Low Minority districts have a below average percentage.
Source: Author’s calculations using R2L data and Common Core of Data, 2019, Nation Center for Education Statistics.

Presidential Vote
Presidential vote indicates counties’ voting histories in the 2020 election. “Majority Trump Votes” refers to a district that resides in a county the majority of the population voted for Donald Trump. “Majority Biden Votes” refers to a district that resides in a county where the majority of the population voted for Joe Biden.

Small Area Income and Poverty Estimates (SAIPE)
Small Area Income and Poverty Estimates from the US Census Bureau report the percentage of children aged 5-17 in poverty at the school district level. High SAIPE refers to districts above the national district average for this measure, and low SAIPE districts are those below the average.
Source: Author’s calculations using R2L data and US Census Bureau Data, 2020, https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/saipe.html

Urbanicity
Urbanicity refers to whether the district is primarily located in urban, suburban or rural locales.
Source: Author’s calculations using R2L data and Common Core of Data, 2019, Nation Center for Education Statistics.

Vaccine Hesitancy
Gathered in March of 2021, Vaccine hesitancy reflects the estimated percentage of people within a county who then indicated that they would “probably not” or “definitely not” receive a COVID-19 vaccine when available. Estimates are based on responses to a question (“Once a vaccine to prevent COVID-19 is available to you, would you get a vaccine?”) from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey (HPS) on March 3, 2021 – March 15, 2021.
Source: Author’s calculations using R2L data and Vaccine Hesitancy for COVID-19: State, County, and Local Estimates, US Department of Health and Human Services, 2021, https://aspe.hhs.gov/pdf-report/vaccine-hesitancy

In-Person instruction 2020-21
Measures of districts in-person instructional offerings are based on 2020-21  . High In-person districts are those who offered more cumulative in person instructional offerings than the national district average.  Low In-Person districts are those whose cumulative offerings were below the national average.
Source: Author’s calculations using R2L Instructional Offerings data.

About

The map of mask requirements and COVID-19 cases displays a heat map of counties by their seven-day average daily case rate per 100,000 population. Each colored dot represents a district color coded according to its mask requirement for the current week.

About

The map of mask requirements and COVID-19 cases displays a heat map of counties by their seven-day average daily case rate per 100,000 population. Each colored dot represents a district color coded according to its mask requirement for the current week.