From Monday, all students and high school staff will no longer need to wear a face mask. Primary school and early childcare centre staff will need to wear masks for an extra week, with their mandate to end on Monday, March 7.Under current restrictions, students from kindergarten to year 6 were encouraged, but not required to wear masks, while they were mandatory for high school students. In addition, parents and guardians will be allowed back on school grounds and school groups will no longer need to be separated on campus. The end of “co-horting” will mean cross-age group activities can resume, like buddy programs and whole-school assemblies.The further easing of restrictions comes after the NSW government said twice-weekly rapid antigen testing for students would no longer be mandatory from next week. Education Minister Sarah Mitchell said the easing of restrictions would mean schools could get “pretty much back to normal”.“After two years of different settings in the school … I want to thank our teachers, our school staff, our principals and our admin staff, and everybody who has worked hard to ensure our schools are Covid-safe,” Ms Mitchell said. “I’m pleased we can get back to normal.”Premier Dominic Perrottet said the changes would make a “real difference” to the lives of children in the state. “For many of our younger children, some have lost a quarter of their entire face-to-face learning time,” he said. “Some said it was unsafe to put kids back in the classroom (this year), but the government did the right thing here, we were completely focused.“I do want to thank our teachers, and our parents. They have ensured a very seamless transition back to school. NSW recorded six new Covid-19 deaths on Wednesday morning, and 8931 new cases of the virus. There are 1246 people in hospital across the state with Covid-19, 69 of whom are in intensive care.
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