AKRON, Ohio – The Akron School Board voted 4-3 on Monday to resume fall sports and marching band, after previously voting to cancel sports and face-to-face extracurricular activities due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Board members Diana Autry and Derrick Hall called Monday’s special meeting, after students and parents held protests and signed petitions asking for sports to resume. Autry and Hall were joined by Board President Patrick Bravo and member Lisa Mansfield in voting in favor of the return of sports, with Bruce Alexander, N.J. Akbar and Valerie McKitrick voting against.

“There is no way for us to completely eliminate the risk associated with the activities that we approved tonight,” Bravo said after the vote. “There will be risk. There will be student-athletes who become sick. There may be family members that also become sick and test positive for COVID-19. And as our Public Health Commissioner [Donna Skoda] stated, the most important part about this decision, should we decide to move forward – which we have – is going to be our ability to know when enough is enough, and when to stop athletics and other in-person extracurricular activities. We are going to have to be monitoring this closely.”

The school board voted on Aug. 10 to pause all sports practices and games, following guidance from the Summit County Public Health department urging districts to hold off on sports until at least Oct. 1.

On Monday, Alexander and McKitrick inquired as to what has changed since the board’s previous vote that would make sports more safe for students, who started the school year all-online. Akbar read a message from a student-athlete who said she was disappointed by the cancelation of sports, but supported the decision as a way to curb the virus and get students back into the classroom, where she learns best.

The board members voted along the same lines, 4 to 3, in favor of bringing back high school marching band. Band will have additional safety measures in place, including outdoor and socially-distanced practices. Only the home team’s band will play at football games, due in part to a shortened half-time period and other restrictions imposed by the Ohio High School Athletics Association and Gov. Mike DeWine’s health orders.