SF State has lifted its mandatory indoor masking protocols and has made wearing one “strongly recommended” as of Sept. 6. Students and faculty will no longer be required to wear masks on campus for the first time since March 2020.
The university is one of the few CSUs that maintained its mask mandate at the start of the semester. SF State followed the CDC’s community transmission level scale to determine if masking would be necessary, said SF State Vice President of Administration & Finance Jeff Wilson in a school-wide email.
According to the CDC, a county’s transmission level is determined using data from hospital admissions and hospital capacity. If a county has fewer than 200 COVID-19 cases per 100,000 people in the past week, then the following requirements are applied.
If COVID-19 hospital admissions are fewer than 10 per 100,000 patients or fewer than 10% of hospital beds are occupied by COVID-19 patients, then a county’s COVID-19 level would be considered “low.”
For the past three weeks, San Francisco has been in the low transmission level.
The City and County of San Francisco reported 68 COVID-19 hospitalizations as of Aug. 30. Additionally, the seven-day rolling average of new cases is 151 per day, as of Aug. 26.
Deborah Craig is a lecturer in the Public Health Department at SF State and is teaching in-person classes this semester.
“I have been pleased and impressed with SF State throughout the pandemic,” Craig said. “I think we’ve done a lot better than many other universities in terms of keeping everyone safe.”
SF State requires all students and faculty partaking in the Fall 2022 semester to be fully vaccinated with a booster shot. Proof of vaccination must be uploaded to the campus’ vaccination verification system, MyHealth.
Exemptions for medical or religious reasons may be honored by request and there is no exception for an online mode of instruction.
Wilson said that masking can no longer be enforced, making this truly an individual’s choice. Though, masks are still required in the Student Health Center, the Athletics Training Room, Physical Therapy Labs and Nursing Labs.
According to Craig, the university hasn’t specified how faculty should address mask-wearing with students.
“It would have been nice to get the [following] message from the administration: please make the change in masking clear to your students, here’s some suggested wording [to tell students],” Craig said.
If San Francisco enters the medium or high transmission levels, then wearing masks indoors will become a requirement once again.
During the weeks of Aug. 28 thru Sept. 3, SF State reported a total of 42 cases of COVID-19. There were also a total of 95 reported cases during the month of August.
“I am concerned [about masks being lifted] because cases are going up,” SF State student Claire Isola said. “I am going to continue masking.”
