The Catholic Diocese of Little Rock released a statement Thursday mandating face masks for all students and staff in Catholic elementary schools in Arkansas. That includes St. Joseph Catholic School in Fayetteville."It's something that I think a month ago we thought maybe we would be able to avoid, but unfortunately in the last two weeks things have changed a lot," said St. Joseph Catholic Schools' assistant principal, Mark Wilburn. "And the numbers have had a big uptick and a lot of fears with this delta variant and so we've made the decision to start the year wearing masks."The mask mandate is for all students 4 and older and all staff members, regardless of vaccination status. Catholics schools do not fall under the same guidelines as public schools, which cannot mandate masks due to ACT 1002.