Over 10,000 students in the Northern Marianas Public School Students will not be mandated to wear a mask when the new school year starts in the next week. In a memo to teachers and staff, Commissioner of Education Dr. Alfred Ada says that "wearing of face masks will no longer be mandated" for employees and students on PSS property, citing the hard work in mitigation efforts since the pandemic began.

Ada also lauded the school systems more than 90-percent vaccination rate augmented by the testing and vaccination sites on campuses. The education commissioner noted that the school system has four nurses and 15 school monitoring and outreach specialists as part of their direct campus response to the virus.

The commissioner says he remains open to adjusting the protocols based on the community risk level, which is now medium.