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Florida schools will have to provide parents the choice of opting-out of mask mandates and unmasked students who face harassment as a result of their choice will be eligible for private school scholarships under new rules adopted by the Department of Education and Health Friday.

“Districts want to protect staff, they want to protect students, but they also want to give parents their right to have some influence over their child’s decisions,” said Executive Director of the Florida School Boards Association Andrea Messina.

Districts are now having to figure out how to keep students safe within the new parameters.

“And I’ve heard some districts talk about perhaps setting up you know, one classroom with masks, one classroom without masks where parents could choose if they wanted their kids to be in that one or the other one,” said Messina.

The Governor has said there was little difference between schools with and without mask mandates, but at least one study we found challenges that claim.

This study of Florida schools cited by the CDC found schools without mask mandates had 42 percent more cases per 100,000 students.

“The preponderant literature clearly states masking is safe and saves lives,” said Former President of the American Academy of Pediatrics Florida Chapter Dr. Paul Robinson.

Robinson joined with other doctors amid prop-gravestones at the Governors mansion Friday to protest the new masking rules.

Robinson said he fears without universal masking, transmission rates will be even worse in schools this year, especially with the more transmissible Delta variant tearing through the state.

“There are children admitted to the hospital at much higher rates and we fear, I think I said I fear, there will be many more deaths as a result of the Delta variant,” said Dr. Robinson.

According to CDC stats 15 children under the age of 18 have died in Florida since the beginning of the pandemic.

That’s compared to 11 pediatric flu deaths and 59 pneumonia deaths during the same period.

If schools don’t comply with the new rules their funding could be put at risk.

At least one school district, Broward, has already discussed a possible lawsuit.

A group of parents filed suit against the Governor Friday morning challenging his executive order that prompted the emergency rules.