Is your county's school reopening a mess like mine?

[katie01]

FL or CA?

I'm in OC, CA. School reopening has been smooth.

In our district (and state), masks are required for everyone and it's strongly enforced. They aren't doing contact tracing and no one is required to quarantine unless they have symptoms or a positive test. Everyone (teachers and students) can come to school as long as they are symptom free. A positive case in a classroom has no effect on anyone other than the kid/teacher who tested positive. The rules surrounding symptoms are very strict, however. Kids who show ANY symptoms have to either be evaluated by a doctor and cleared to return with a note or have to test negative for covid before returning.

My husband has covid right now and is in isolation since last Sunday and my kids are allowed to go to school since they have no symptoms. I spoke to the district and school site nurse prior to sending them in. We are all vaccinated, but the rules would not have changed if my kids weren't. We went for PCR tests today just for informational purposes, as none of us have symptoms and it's been 5 days.

oh no! That stinks that your husband got it even while vaccinated, this is what scares me for our vaccinated family too. Do you feel comfortable sharing how bad his symptoms are? Praying it's very mild and you all stay healthy

 

[Christine]

Our schools start next week so I have no idea how it will go. My coworker decided to send his kids to a camp last week so they could do something this year and get them in a routine prior to school. That lasted all of 2 days and the camp had to be shut down. A child came to camp, got sick, turns out his parents were in a hotel quarantining with COVID, they didn't think the child had it, and felt it was okay to send him to camp even though he'd been around the parents. So camp shut down, everyone in quarantine, no refund on camp money!

 

[DLgal]

oh no! That stinks that your husband got it even while vaccinated, this is what scares me for our vaccinated family too. Do you feel comfortable sharing how bad his symptoms are? Praying it's very mild and you all stay healthy

Sure. So, we are pretty sure he caught it outdoors at a retirement party where no one was masked. He developed symptoms 48 hours after that, almost exactly. Very severe nasal and ear congestion which came on very suddenly (that was a big red flag, because he never has that...no allergies or anything like that). He also began to feel feverish. His temp was 100.0 and we happened to have some rapid tests at home (which I HIGHLY recommend, by the way...Abbott Binax Now, available at CVS, Walmart and Walgreens). It turned positive even before the control line showed up. It was a very strong positive result. We masked him up and banished him to our guest room and I proceeded to also mask up and clean and disinfect the ENTIRE HOUSE.

His symptoms lasted about 2 days. He never took any OTC meds. Mostly just had the head congestion and some chills that would come and go every time he stood up to use the bathroom. His body temp actually remained in the 97 range the whole time after the initial elevated temp. He never lost smell or taste and his appetite has been fine. It's been very, very mild. We had a cold 3 weeks ago that was HORRIBLE and this was nothing at all like that was. He actually still has a lingering cough from that cold because it turned inro bronchitis for him. He is otherwise a very healthy military man with no risk factors.

The rest of us have remained symptom free and I've been periodically doing rapid tests for myself and one son just to make sure we aren't sending him to school with covid (my son has bad allergies and is always stuffed up, runny nose and sneezing, so I wanted to do my due diligence even though the school didn't require testing). The kids first day of school was Thursday so we were scrambling around Monday and Tuesday trying to get answers about the district protocols, which they revised literally Monday night after guidance from the county health agency. They changed the rules for vaccinated students, specifically. But then, I read all the guidance and the quarantine requirements were the same for all students, vaccinated or not. The only difference is that unvacinated students with a close contact at home DO have to be rapid tested, whether symptomatic or not, periodically, in order to remain at school after a close contact exposure.

 

[Wendy1985]

FL

I was told our state can’t mandate mask I wish my county would but parents care more about their rights then the safety of others

 

[Disneyfan754321]

I'm in Orange county and we have a dashboard to see the number of infections and quarantines. I found it odd that neighboring counties had less infections yet more listed as quarantined. Turns out our Dept of Health doesn't have enough contact tracers. My coworker's son's class had a student test positive. I asked her what she is supposed to do and she said she doesn't know. She has to wait for a phone call from the health department. What a mess!

Ha I live in south Florida ... i think all of Florida is a mess.

 

[Magical2017]

I am not quite sure right now but the school is supposed to put something out before it starts August 30th. My kids are both vaccinated and thankfully our district has a mask mandate for all schools.K-12 teachers are required to get vaccinated or tested weekly if they have an exemption. I know there will still be cases.

 

[katie01]

Sure. So, we are pretty sure he caught it outdoors at a retirement party where no one was masked. He developed symptoms 48 hours after that, almost exactly. Very severe nasal and ear congestion which came on very suddenly (that was a big red flag, because he never has that...no allergies or anything like that). He also began to feel feverish. His temp was 100.0 and we happened to have some rapid tests at home (which I HIGHLY recommend, by the way...Abbott Binax Now, available at CVS, Walmart and Walgreens). It turned positive even before the control line showed up. It was a very strong positive result. We masked him up and banished him to our guest room and I proceeded to also mask up and clean and disinfect the ENTIRE HOUSE.

His symptoms lasted about 2 days. He never took any OTC meds. Mostly just had the head congestion and some chills that would come and go every time he stood up to use the bathroom. His body temp actually remained in the 97 range the whole time after the initial elevated temp. He never lost smell or taste and his appetite has been fine. It's been very, very mild. We had a cold 3 weeks ago that was HORRIBLE and this was nothing at all like that was. He actually still has a lingering cough from that cold because it turned inro bronchitis for him. He is otherwise a very healthy military man with no risk factors.

The rest of us have remained symptom free and I've been periodically doing rapid tests for myself and one son just to make sure we aren't sending him to school with covid (my son has bad allergies and is always stuffed up, runny nose and sneezing, so I wanted to do my due diligence even though the school didn't require testing). The kids first day of school was Thursday so we were scrambling around Monday and Tuesday trying to get answers about the district protocols, which they revised literally Monday night after guidance from the county health agency. They changed the rules for vaccinated students, specifically. But then, I read all the guidance and the quarantine requirements were the same for all students, vaccinated or not. The only difference is that unvacinated students with a close contact at home DO have to be rapid tested, whether symptomatic or not, periodically, in order to remain at school after a close contact exposure.

thank you so much for sharing your experience! I’m very happy to hear your husband didn’t get too terribly sick and the rest of you have remained negative for covid too. That’s a good idea to stock up on the tests, with everyone back at school and work now. Stay well!

 

[MrsCobraBubbles]

*update, my kids and I are sick and being sent for covid testing. We didn't even make it one week.

Yes! I'm walking around in the halls with over a thousand unmasked kids, we just started last week so I'm waiting for us to become like Florida. It might take a few weeks though because our cases are nowhere near as high as yours, but I think it's coming. I'm looking for another job, time to get out of education. It makes me sad that the school board's bad choices are making me leave a career that I love.

My son had Covid and was left with 2 heart conditions, I'm terrified that I will bring Covid home to him. Yes, he is vaccinated but vaccines don't work 100% and his weakened heart theoretically puts him at high risk from another Covid infection. My daughter isn't old enough to be vaccinated yet. I wish this hadn't become such a divisive issue, common sense says to wear masks and limit contact with others to stop the spread, right? And instead we are doing the opposite for what reason?

 

[randumb0]

Yes! I'm walking around in the halls with over a thousand unmasked kids, we just started last week so I'm waiting for us to become like Florida. It might take a few weeks though because our cases are nowhere near as high as yours, but I think it's coming. I'm looking for another job, time to get out of education. It makes me sad that the school board's bad choices are making me leave a career that I love.

My son had Covid and was left with 2 heart conditions, I'm terrified that I will bring Covid home to him. Yes, he is vaccinated but vaccines don't work 100% and his weakened heart theoretically puts him at high risk from another Covid infection. My daughter isn't old enough to be vaccinated yet. I wish this hadn't become such a divisive issue, common sense says to wear masks and limit contact with others to stop the spread, right? And instead we are doing the opposite for what reason?

Oh it's coming unfortunately. It looks like Delta has hit the southern states the hardest, but it will find it's way north. I'm frustrated because my son said there are 2 kids in his class that doesn't wear a mask and one of them has a really bad cough

 

[tcufrog]

Our schools start next week so I have no idea how it will go. My coworker decided to send his kids to a camp last week so they could do something this year and get them in a routine prior to school. That lasted all of 2 days and the camp had to be shut down. A child came to camp, got sick, turns out his parents were in a hotel quarantining with COVID, they didn't think the child had it, and felt it was okay to send him to camp even though he'd been around the parents. So camp shut down, everyone in quarantine, no refund on camp money!

My sons went to a sleepaway camp run by Camp Fire this summer. They had very well-thought-out COVID protocols and precautions created in conjunction with local public health officials and an epidemiologist. My kids didn't get COVID and they didn't have any outbreaks at any of their sessions. A lot of the camps that had outbreaks weren't that careful.

 

[Christine]

My sons went to a sleepaway camp run by Camp Fire this summer. They had very well-thought-out COVID protocols and precautions created in conjunction with local public health officials and an epidemiologist. My kids didn't get COVID and they didn't have any outbreaks at any of their sessions. A lot of the camps that had outbreaks weren't that careful.

I think the issue with my coworker's experience was a parent who was knowingly infected and quarantining already and not telling anyone, thinking it was okay for the kids to go to camp. I'm not sure the most careful of camps could know how to handle a jerk like that.

 

[Luv Bunnies]

The district where I worked has been in session for two days. So far, so good. I transferred to a different campus this year and am getting familiar with my new co-workers. I'm a teaching assistant in a special ed class for 3rd, 4th and 5th graders. We only have six students right now and all are good about wearing their masks. I've had to give a few reminders to pull the masks up over their noses, but they're really good with masks overall. Staff and students have to complete an online health check every morning before arriving at school. Parents are not allowed to enter campus or classrooms. They stand in designated areas outside of the quad where they can see their kids' walk to or from their classrooms. We walk out with our students at dismissal to ensure they find their parents.

Starting next week, the district will publish a Covid dashboard. We will able to see any reported cases among staff and students at the district level. We have one district nurse who is focusing solely on Covid this year. She will work through each case, acting as a contact tracer and notifying anyone who needs to know. Our state (California) is mandating vaccines for educators. We've been told that over 90 percent of our staff are already vaccinated. Those who aren't have until mid-October to get their shots. Otherwise, they will need to be tested weekly. I think our district is doing just about all they can to keep us safe. We'll see how things unfold over the coming weeks and months.

 

[Skippy918]

We started school on the 12th and the district has had around 200 cases so far. Quarantine is optional and no one knows how kids are supposed make up work if they are out for 2 weeks quarantining.

 

[rigs32]

With a lot of places/events requiring FDA approved vaccines, I had to get a J&J yesterday as my two Astrazeneca shots from 2020 (vaccine trial) are becoming less accepted. I wanted to go on a Saturday so I could recover over the weekend and not miss work. The only Saturday location this weekend was a school in a lower income neighborhood. I got to chatting with some of the folks running the clinic and learned that our County is hosting back to school vaccine events at a number of schools in lower income areas. I'm in NYS, so school doesn't start until after Labor Day, but I loved the idea and was heartened to see how many people were there.

 

[prairie_girl]

School doesn’t start here until after Labour Day long weekend.
Masks will be mandatory so I don’t anticipate a huge explosion of cases.
Plus we have like 81% of the population vaccinated.

I don’t have kids in school but I’m glad all school divisions have made masks mandatory. Same with the Universities and RRC.

Fingers crossed that we don’t see a fourth wave. I’m not sure people would accept another lockdown.

 

[jaiminee krikit]

No issues so far here. I'm in Illinois, our local schools went back last week. We have a statewide mask mandate for all schools and our schoolboard had an emergency meeting two weeks ago for discussion. A handful of angry parents spoke, the schoolboard voted to follow the mandate, and the handful of angry parents threatened, "Wait 'til you see what we have planned for the first day of school". From what I heard (DD had a dentist appointment so we couldn't see for ourselves), it was 5 people standing in front of one of the schools "protesting".
Since DD graduated I'm not receiving the weekly covid updates from the district, but I haven't heard or seen anything, and if numbers were high there would be a lot of talk about it on social media.

 

[GAN]

No mess here in RI. Don't wear a mask, don't go to school. Makes it easy for everyone.....

 

[spiders]

They opened without masks and then began requiring them at an individual school level depending on cases.

 

[starry_solo]

I'm in Orange county and we have a dashboard to see the number of infections and quarantines. I found it odd that neighboring counties had less infections yet more listed as quarantined. Turns out our Dept of Health doesn't have enough contact tracers. My coworker's son's class had a student test positive. I asked her what she is supposed to do and she said she doesn't know. She has to wait for a phone call from the health department. What a mess!

This is all based upon a co-worker: After a child's classmate tested positive for COVID, people were told on Friday (the particular child that tested positive last went to school on Wednesday and was out sick Thursday and Friday). My co-worker had to pick the child up from school and quarantine with her. They tested on Saturday but was told that was too soon and had to test again, the earliest was Tuesday. They tested Wednesday, got the results Thursday, and she was back to work on following Friday).

How long has it been since the co-worker's son last saw the child who is assumed to have been positive (no one was told which child it was, just that it was a child in the class)

 

[randumb0]

So a friend of a friend said both they and their child have had fevers and are calling it the "back to school flu". They're planning on sending their child to school today