After 50 COVID cases, 200 quarantines, Johnson County district toughens mask mandate
READ MORE
COVID-19 safety in schools
For the new school year, as COVID-19 cases are surging and hospitals are turning away patients, Kansas City area districts are making decisions about safety.
Expand All
The Gardner Edgerton district began the school year last week with a mask requirement for younger students, but not high schoolers. Now 50 students and staff have tested positive for the virus, and more than 200 have been required to quarantine.
After one week of classes, the district is facing staffing issues due to a substitute teacher shortage, said Jody Marshall, human resources director. Given the trends in COVID-19 transmission, the school board voted 4-1 Monday night to mandate masks for all grade levels.
“Last week reflects the worst COVID-related absenteeism, or positives and quarantines, since the first week in January. So that’s pretty significant in my mind, and it is having an impact on our staffing,” Marshall said.
He said the district also is noticing some in-school transmission — something that health officials said was largely avoided last year, thanks in part to universal mask wearing. Now that the highly contagious delta variant has taken hold, Marshall said there is evidence showing two incidences of workplace transmission among staff, as well as transmission in four classrooms.
All four classrooms were at the secondary level, where masks were made optional.
Since staff returned to school buildings, the district has reported 53 COVID cases among students and employees, and 206 quarantines, Marshall said Monday. The majority of quarantines, 90 total, were reported at the high school level.
After only six days of classroom instruction, Marshall reported 154 teacher absences. Of those, 112 required substitutes, 25 of which had to be filled internally due to staffing shortages. That means, teachers gave up planning time to fill in for another class, he said.
The district in southwest Johnson County has roughly 6,000 students.
Gardner Edgerton, along with the Spring Hill district, started the school year with more relaxed masking rules than other districts in Johnson County and much of the Kansas City area. They both followed Johnson County’s health order mandating masks in private and public schools that serve students as old as sixth grade.
The other districts in the county went further than that and mandated masks for all grade levels.
But with the Gardner Edgerton’s decision Monday, Spring Hill is now the only district without a mask requirement for secondary students. The district also has allowed parents to sign mask exemption forms for students without doctor verification, essentially making masks optional.
Two other districts in the Kansas City area decided to institute mask mandates after seeing cases and quarantines spike within the first week of classes. The Turner district, in Kansas City, Kansas, and Raymore-Peculiar in Cass County both began the school year without mask rules, but then quickly added mandates.
With COVID-19 cases surging, health officials have warned that unmasked and unvaccinated classrooms could lead to outbreaks and even building closures. As the delta variant rampages through the community, hospitals are reaching capacity and more children are contracting the virus.
Last fall, several districts moved students back to online-only classes when COVID-19 cases and mass quarantines led to staffing shortages, making it difficult to keep school doors open.
But this fall, districts don’t have that option, after the state Legislature placed restrictions on public schools’ use of remote instruction.
Requiring everyone to wear masks is one way to cut down on quarantines. Under health department guidance, in many cases, if students or teachers were wearing masks when exposed to COVID-19, and remain asymptomatic, they will be allowed to remain in school.
Worried that the district’s trend in cases and quarantines would quickly be unsustainable, the Gardner Edgerton school board agreed to expand its mask mandate to everyone. The mandate will start on Aug. 30.
Officials said they would revisit the decision at the board meeting next month.
This story was originally published August 24, 2021 at 2:11 PM.
