Liam Halawith Maroon Echoes Editor-In-Cheif Mount Pleasant Community Schools’ superintendent John Henriksen announced that 76 quarantined students will return this week due to a change in the official close contact protocols.
According to Henriksen, the Department of Education and the Iowa Department of Public Health modified their close contact protocols for public schools on Monday. The old protocol stated that if students were within six feet of an infected student for 15 minutes or more, the student in close contact would be quarantined for 14 days. The newly revised protocol states that if both students are wearing masks, correctly, then the students previously considered in close contact would no longer be quarantined. According to High School Principal Todd Lichety, 76 out of the 96 quarantine students would be able to return to school as soon as Tuesday. School Board President Jennifer Crull expressed her frustration with the revision, asking to see the data that supports the change in protocol. According to Lichety, they have seen no cases in the high school where a student tests positive while in quarantine for close contact at school. Meaning that spread of the virus is not happening in the school building amongst students. Crull however would like to see more than anecdotal evidence to support the modification. She is frustrated with the state for treating education like “Guinea Pigs”. “I want to see it statewide. If this is the change then it should be the case for everything the state does. What’s bothering me is the changes being made on education are not being made everywhere else in the state,” Crull said. In other news, the board discussed changes to the district’s hybrid plan. The district’s new plan will now have grades 6-12 in 50% face to face learning when the hybrid plan is in effect. The student body will be split alphabetically in their grade level and put into Group A (gold) and Group B (maroon). Each group of students would then attend every other day or 5 days in a two week period while continuing to complete work online or at home. The board also clarified that the metrics outlined in their return to learn plan would be a minimum for them to consider the district’s move to a hybrid model and that our positivity rate is greatly impacted by the Mt. Pleasant Correctional facility that does not affect community spread as they are isolated. However, Public Health Director Shelly Van Dorin has stated that community spread is occurring in Henry County. The district has stated that they will continue face to face learning at this time.
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November 2020
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