Aaron Niebel is a junior in high school and lives in Hollis.
Transcript:
Last year was my sophomore year and it was basically ruined for me. I suffered from a lot of depression and I’ve never suffered that much with my mental health, until that year.
I didn’t know it at first but it turned out it was just because the year was not normal, it was stressful. I would sleep a lot and I didn’t know why. I would just sleep to escape and stress eat.
Every time I think about going to school now, going into my junior year, I get a pit in my stomach, when normally I’d feel excited to have a fresh start in a new year.
One thing I wonder every time I hear about masks being mandated in our schools, how come my family can go out to a restaurant and eat without a mask even entering the restaurant without a mask and I can’t get an education without having a mask mandated for 5 days a week, 7+ hours a day?
So, can I ask people, in this room… if you support making masks optional, please stand up.
