Clay-Battelle High School canceled a football game Friday night and launched a deep cleaning of the school and its athletic facilities, after a football coach tested positive for COVID-19.
Monongalia County Schools made the announcement just one day after students returned to their classrooms — following a seven-month stint of remote learning wrought by the pandemic.
Mon Schools Superintendent Eddie Campbell Jr. said the coach who tested positive technically isn’t employed by the district, which often relies on volunteers or workers contracted from the outside to provide help with certain academic services or extracurricular offerings, such as football.
Friday’s positive case brings the number to four in the district.
Last month, an employee at Morgantown High was diagnosed, along with two others at North Elementary: An employee, plus a student who was able to return early as per state mandate because of cognitive and physical challenges.
Meanwhile, the most recent news in Mon is also being carried in on the winds of discontent — felt by teachers and others across the Mountain State.
The West Virginia Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers, two leading unions for educators in the state, have publicly chided Gov. Jim Justice in recent days over changes to the two color-coded maps used by the state to track the coronavirus.
Both unions, in particular, have accused the governor of tweaking the metrics on the map, allowing counties — Mon, included — to leapfrog into “green” at the expense of public health and safety.
However, that’s Charleston and not Mon County, both Campbell and Clay-Battelle principal David Cottrell said Friday.
Clay-Battelle was the mission in Mon on this day, they said.
There are around 30 players on the Cee-Bees football team, and Cottrell said he’s made personal contact with every one of their parents and caregivers, letting them know the school is doing everything it can to ensure safety.
Same for the county, said Campbell, who called COVID cases here “an inevitability” at present.
The superintendent said the district will act accordingly with quarantines and closures, should such measures become necessary.
“We’ll put the district on hiatus, if we have to.”
