Friday wasn’t a skip day for COVID-19 in Monongalia County Schools.
The district reported two additional cases at South Middle and Morgantown High, which will now necessitate the quarantining of several students for safety, Superintendent Eddie Campbell Jr. said.
At South Middle, it was believed the student who tested positive there had contracted the virus from a parent, Campbell said.
That case also put four classmates into quarantine, the superintendent said.
The MHS diagnosis, Campbell said, isn’t related to earlier cases on the girls basketball team over this week and last that benched 17 additional players and three coaches as a precaution.
Still, another student did test positive, he said, and five classmates will also be out of school for the next two weeks for the county mandated quarantine.
Another employee at Suncrest Elementary is also COVID-positive, Campbell said, with a coworker also in quarantine after contact tracing.
With that, though, he said, the Moderna vaccine still went into the arms of teachers and employees that morning at MHS.
An additional 160 workers in the 40- and 50-year age range received their second dose of the Moderna vaccine, reported Susan Haslebacher, the district’s supervisor of school health.
According to the properties of the vaccine, that should mean an immunity rate of better than 90%, which Campbell said he appreciated hearing.
“You have to feel good about that,” he said.
He’d feel better about additional dosages, he said, but future clinics are now on hold pending manufacture and distribution of vaccines.
In the meantime, he was also thinking about percentages of another kind Friday.
That’s because the district is readying for a five-day-a-week return to school this coming week and thereafter, as per the state Board of Education.
Pre-kindergarten through fifth grade will report Monday, with middle-schoolers returning Wednesday.
Grades 9-12 will begin five-day-a-week instruction the following Monday.
Deputy Superintendent Donna Talerico said earlier all the pandemic protocols will be in place, including the addition of dividers to partition classrooms.
Masking will be strictly enforced, she said, with social distancing among students at 3 feet in classrooms and a 6-foot grid in cafeterias.
Campbell said to expect anywhere from 70% to 80% attendance overall in the district, using numbers from individual schools as rough average.
“We’re going with what the schools and families are telling us,” he said.
While students, teachers and others in Mon’s schools continue to grapple with the coronavirus, every case noted by the district to date, the superintendent reiterated, has been a result of community spread – and not building-to-building.
“That’s why it’s important we don’t let up,” he said.
TWEET@DominionPostWV
