Georgetown students speak out against 'completely senseless' mask mandate in classrooms

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Georgetown students speak out against mask mandates: 'They are doing it for optics'

Georgetown students Katelyn Rickert and Jessica Costescu slam Georgetown University for their over-the-top mask mandate policies

Two Georgetown University students said Friday the university’s mask mandate in classrooms seems more about control than science.

"We were told that when we came back to campus and we are in a classroom with the professor. We had to have a mask on," Campus Reform correspondent Katelyn Rickert told "Fox & Friends."

"Now, you don't have to wear a mask in the gym. You don't have to wear a mask in the cafeteria, not in the library, not study spaces, not in the dorms, only in the classroom when you're with the professor," she said, adding that professors don't have to wear the mask.

GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY MANDATES MASKS FOR STUDENTS DURING IN-CLASS INSTRUCTION

Georgetown University is requiring its students to continue wearing masks during in-class instruction this fall amid lingering cases of COVID-19 and nationwide outbreaks of monkeypox.

The mask mandate, which applies to students in classrooms and teaching laboratories, does not apply to "informal gatherings" at places such as libraries and study spaces, according to public health guidance the Washington, D.C., school released Wednesday.

White-Gravenor Hall of Georgetown University in Washington D.C. (OlegAlbinsky via Getty Images) (OlegAlbinsky via Getty Images)

Students heading into the third fall term since the pandemic are also required to mask up on university-sponsored public transportation and in university health care facilities. In accordance with ongoing D.C. rules, every student who was in quarantine must continue wearing masks for 10 days.

Unless they have an approved medical or religious exemption, students, faculty, staff and visitors to Georgetown are required to have received a primary series of COVID-19 vaccination, as well as a booster if they are eligible.

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"We're standing up to this for the students," Rickert said, calling the mandate "unscientific" and "outrageous."

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"Jessica and I are juniors and we have not had a single year without COVID on campus. I spent my entire freshman year in my living room doing class, and it's just not the same experience as being on a college campus," she told Katie Pavlich. 

Rickert said the mandate is "senseless" since students immediately take their masks off when they leave the classroom.

Fellow Campus Reform correspondent Jessica Costescu agreed, saying the policy appears to be more about "optics." She said the university is not keeping with its motto of "following the science."

Several colleges and universities across the nation reinstated mask mandates last spring amid a "significant increase" in COVID-19 cases on campus. 

Fox News' Jon Brown contributed to this report.