Wednesday, September 30, 2020

THAT MANDATORY STUDENT COVID-19 TESTING ISN'T SO MANDATORY ANY LONGER

 From the DOE:

Monthly testing of randomly selected staff and students is a vital part of our efforts to prevent COVID-19 transmission in our buildings, because it helps identify positive COVID-19 cases when symptoms are not present. As with other health and safety measures we are requiring to keep our staff and students safe, the success of this testing initiative relies on the partnership and cooperation of staff and students.  

While consent to testing is not mandatory, providing our testing partners with a sufficient monthly sample size to identify the prevalence of COVID-19 is critical in our ongoing fight against this virus and to ensure we can keep school communities in school buildings for in-person learning. For the safety of our school community, students who do not have consent forms on file may be required to learn remotely if we do not receive forms from enough students in the school. 

We want to assure you that if your child is selected for testing but is uncomfortable or unable to be tested, we will not test your child and will work with you to address any concerns so that they can participate in future testing. We are focused on making this a brief, and gentle experience for our students, led by trained testers.

Some reaction on Twitter:



7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Cam I say it? Are you dues payers content? It is something new every day.

Anonymous said...

Off too a good start, right mulgrew?
Tonight many high schools remain severely short-staffed & won’t be able to provide in-person instruction tomorrow to all students. They’ll do their best to have adult supervision but many students will be communicating w/their actual teacher via laptops IF they have tech/internet

High schools have licensing requirements for specific subject areas, which presents additional staffing challenges. Many ATRs have not returned calls. Many in central staff have opted not to provide in-person instruction. And there’s shortage of subs in specific license areas.
Principals and their teams are working at this late hour trying to make ends meet under very trying circumstances with inadequate support, staff, and technology for their students.
Principals have noted that these staffing shortages will also unquestionably impact their ability to comply with IEP mandates, which will hurt kids who need and are required to receive additional in-person support.

Anonymous said...

I'm in the ATR and I didn't receive a call. I don't know where you got that info from.

Anonymous said...

That is from Mark Treyger.

TJL said...

Good. Next, teachers need to be given the same option and not given a suspension without pay for refusing one of these tests.

waitingforsupport said...

@ 11:14 am
What do you mean by "many ATRs have not returned calls"?

BxT said...

No longer exists for D75.... James, perhaps you can post link.