Waterford schools report 5 new cases
Waterford — While five new cases of COVID-19 in town public schools have been identified since Friday, the district is keeping schools open and continuing in the hybrid learning mode.
In an email to parents, guardians and staff on Monday, Superintendent Thomas Giard said two members of the Great Neck Elementary School community, one person at Clark Lane Middle School and two people at Waterford High School have tested positive for the coronavirus. Giard said the school system has been working with Ledge Light Health District on conducting contact tracing and other steps.
“The LLHD Director and I spoke over the weekend and made the decision for our schools to remain open at this time due to a variety of factors,” Giard’s email read. “We will continue to assess the situation in an ongoing manner.”
Giard explained Monday that the decision to keep schools open was made for a variety of reasons, such as: the last time a person was in a building, how quickly the school system and health district can identify close contacts, the number of them and whether the person was in a cohort of students.
Broader factors, including in-school transmission versus transmission in the community, whether various cases are connected, and the ability to continue meeting mitigation strategies are weighed, as well.
Other schools in the region also have had issues.
Ledyard Superintendent of Schools Jason S. Hartling announced Sunday that a positive COVID-19 case forced Ledyard High School to move to full remote learning for the next two weeks with in-person learning expected to resume Nov. 23.
Also on Sunday, New London Superintendent of Schools Cynthia Ritchie informed families that city schools would be closed to all in-person student learning this coming week because more time is needed to conduct tracing efforts related to two positive COVID-19 cases identified on Thursday. Nine cases in total were reported last week in the school district.
In New London County, Waterford, Montville, Norwich, Ledyard, Groton, North Stonington and New London have all been classified as “red zones” by the state, meeting a threshold of 15 or more cases per 100,000 population per day. New London has the highest rate of cases per 100,000 population per day, at 53.3.