9-year-old Novalee, who attends elementary school in Lakeville, Minnesota went viral after her speech to the school board regarding masking children in schools and the Black Lives Matter movement. Novalee recently shared at a Mask Off MN meeting, calling out Minnesota Governor Tim Walz for his inaction regarding masking requirements for children.
Novalee explained that she struggled so much to wear a mask at school that her parents decided to have her try distance learning in the Fall of 2020. She had such a difficult time that she had to go to therapy to try to help her cope with the isolation. She said that therapy didn’t help because, “Making sense out of nonsense doesn’t work, any way you stretch it.”
In her speech, she defined child abuse as outlined in Minnesota law, emphasizing the section where it condemns restricting a child’s ability to breathe. She stated that masks do exactly that, equating forcing children to wear masks to child abuse.
Novalee shared that throughout this year, she spent hours in the principal’s office for refusing to properly mask. She said that at one point she was chased and grabbed by school staff for not masking and that another staff member tried to forcibly put a mask on her face.
Other times, she said that school staff would use her class to try to bribe her to properly wear a mask, withholding gym time or other fun activities and even postponing going to the lunch room until Novalee agreed to wear a mask.
Her initial speech to the school board went viral, with many applauding her for her words against the mandatory masking of students in schools as well as condemning the Black Lives Matter posters that had been hung in her elementary school.
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Hayley Tschetter is a reporter with The Minnesota Sun | Star News Network and The College Fix. She graduated with a degree in Communications from the University of Northwestern-St. Paul. Send news tips to [email protected].
