Rising COVID case counts impact select CPS classes

With a recent rise in positive COVID cases, School Superintendent Dr. Jennifer Fischer-Mueller announced a temporary shift to remote-only learning for select classes at each of the three elementary schools. Most, if not all of the impacted classes should be back to hybrid learning by next week.

At the John F. Kennedy School, one grade 4 classroom and three grade 5 classrooms were shifted to remote last week and were due to resume hybrid learning on January 25. Another grade 5 classroom will stay remote through January 29 with hybrid learning due to resume on February 1.

Additionally, all grade 5 classrooms at the Hansen School and one grade 5 classroom at the Luce School were moved to remote as of January 21. All of these classes were scheduled to resume the hybrid model as of today, January 28.

Fischer-Mueller maintains that there is still no evidence of school-based transmission, but rather transmission is occurring within families. “I still think the schools are doing very well,” she said.

In other COVID-related news from last week’s School Committee meeting, Fischer-Mueller reported that school officials are continuing to investigate various COVID testing options, including a new pooled testing program offered by the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) and Department of Public Health.

Fischer-Mueller said she was scheduled to participate in a DESE meeting on the program, which is free to participating districts for the first six weeks, after which point the district would pick up all expenses related to testing, administration and record keeping. Pooled testing, she explained, involves “mixing 10 to 25 test samples together in a ‘batch’ or ‘pool’ and then testing the pooled sample with a PCR test for detection of COVID-19.”

“This approach increases the number of individuals that can be tested using the same amount of resources as a single PCR test,” she said. “The test is performed at least once per week with an anterior nasal swab for students and staff members. Results are delivered within approximately 24 to 48 hours. If a pooled test result is negative, then all individuals within that pool are presumed negative and may continue to remain in school. If a pooled test result is positive, then all individuals in the pool must quarantine until they are retested individually.”

Also at last week’s School Committee meeting, CHS Assistant Principal Josh Fogel shared a report detailing the number of positive COVID-19 cases within each school over a specific period of time. CPS plans to post a dashboard with this data on the school website that will be updated regularly.

On the subject of COVID vaccinations, Fischer-Mueller said she is hopeful that school employees will be able to receive the vaccine sometime in mid to late February through March. The timing is dependent on the town receiving vaccines from the state in a timely manner …

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Posted by Mike Berger on Jan 29 2021. Filed under News, Schools. Both comments and pings are currently closed.