State refines reopening guidance
Recommendations use county coronavirus data
If the new school year started today, schools across Montgomery County should begin at least in part virtually, according to new guidance from the state.
The state Department of Education and Department of Health on Monday unveiled a new tool aimed at helping school districts decide whether to reopen school buildings that have been closed since mid-March because of the coronavirus pandemic. It uses county-level COVID-19 data to group counties into one of three categories of risk of community spread: low, moderate or substantial.
For each of those three categories, recommendations on how to educate students is provided:
• Low risk — Full in-person or a mix of virtual and in-person that reduces the number of students in a school at one time.
• Moderate risk — A mix of virtual and in-person that reduces the number of students in a school at one time or full-virtual.
• Substantial risk — Full virtual.
Montgomery County sits in the moderate category. Across the state, 25 counties are in the low-risk category, 41 are in moderate and one is in substantial. The one in substantial is Union County, where increasing numbers are mostly linked to an outbreak at a federal prison.
The tool will be updated weekly, and designations will be posted on the Department of Education website.
If a county changes categories, state officials are recommending school leaders wait a week before making a change to instructional models to make sure the change sticks.
However, if a significant out
break of COVID-19 occurs in a county, the Department of Health may ask districts to move more quickly and aggressively in changing instruction models to fully-remote learning.
“We remain committed to helping our school leaders make thoughtful decisions about the 2020-21 school year, while helping Pennsylvania stem the tide of COVID-19 infections in our communities,” Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine said. “From the beginning of this pandemic, we have said that decisions would be based on science and on data. These recommendations use that data to help schools make local decisions.”
The recommendations included in the new tool are not requirements.
Secretary of Education Dr. Pedro Rivera said Monday that he doesn’t have the authority to mandate that schools follow the guidance, but is trying to make sure local school officials have as much information as possible before making decisions.
“What we can do is what we are doing,” he said.
Levine echoed that, saying the thought behind the guidance is to make sure local school leaders are making informed decisions.
“The idea is to provide another tool in the tool box,” she said.
State officials said the new tool is the result of school officials’ repeated requests for more concrete guidance in how to handle the new school year.
“Since unveiling initial public health guidance for schools earlier in the summer, both the departments of education and health have engaged with superintendents and other education leaders regarding their questions and concerns,” Deputy Secretary for Elementary and Secondary Education Matthew Stem said. “With the continued uncertainty and varying infection rates across the state, school leaders have asked for additional guidance to help them make decisions about reopening schools.
“This tool responds to those requests by aligning public health conditions in counties directly to recommendations for the delivery of instruction.”
Levine shared a similar sentiment.
“We have heard you,” she said Monday.
Levine said all the actions taken by the Department of Health and Department of Education are designed to be precise and targeted in fighting the pandemic. That includes the new tool, which is using widely accepted forms of data to help inform local decision makers.
“The metrics are, in fact, the national standards,” she said. “We are using the same metrics as the White House task force.”
The metrics being used are counties’ COVID-19 seven-day incidence rate and percent positivity, which are available on the Department of Health’s COVID-19 Early Warning Monitoring System Dashboard.
The following is a breakdown of what those metrics look like in each risk category:
• Low — An incident rate of less than 10 per 100,000 residents over the past seven days and a seven-day positivity rate less than 5%.
• Moderate — An incident rate between 10 and 100 per 100,000 residents over the past seven days and a seven-day positivity rate between 5% and 10%.
• Substantial — An incident rate of greater than 100 per 100,000 residents over the past seven days and a seven-day positivity rate greater than 10%.
Levine and Rivera acknowledged that, even with all the data in the world, school officials are still being forced to make tough choices. They’re decisions that will have a major impact on students, families, teachers, staff and the community.
“There are sometimes no good choices,” Levine said. “We have to choose the least-bad choice.”
State and local officials are doing their best to pull off a difficult balancing act, Levine added, trying to accommodate the needs of students and protect the public health.
“We’re trying to thread that needle,” she said, adding that that sometimes makes things difficult for kids. “But we have to prevent the spread of this dangerous disease.”
Levine said schools have a large part to play in that effort. While children have seemed to be less likely to become severely ill from COVID-19, they are able to spread it to family members and the community. And schools contain a lot more than just kids, with faculty and staff also playing into the equations.
It all adds up to schools having the potential of becoming “super spreaders” of COVID-19, Levine said.