SAN ANTONIO — North East Independent School District announced its safety plan for in-person classes.
Students will begin the school year in a virtual setting only, but the district outlined its future protocols and guidelines.
The district says they budgeted for the necessary cleaning and sanitization supplies that will be needed to open schools. The Texas Education Agency (TEA) also provided additional supplies to school districts. All classrooms and entrances will be equipped with hand sanitizer. Bathrooms will be stocked with soap and paper towels. Personal-size hand sanitizer will be allowed.
During the first week of in-person school, all students will receive instruction on appropriate hygiene practices, mitigation strategies and social distancing expectations.
Parents, guardians are expected to screen their students for COVID-19 symptoms each day prior to sending their students to school by checking for the following:
- Cough
- Sore Throat
- Shortness of breath
- Loss of taste or smell
- Chills
- Diarrhea
- Repeated shaking with chills
- Feeling feverish or temperature greater than or equal to 100° F
- Muscle pain
- Headache
- Known close contact in the last 14 days with a person who has COVID-19
Schools are expected to follow Governor Abbott's Executive Order for wearing face coverings over the nose and mouth except when participating in activities that cannot be conducted with a face covering on, like lunch breaks.
As for teachers, the district will require them to follow these guidelines:
- Require hand hygiene before entering the classroom and after group activities.
- Increase the space between desks and utilize every square inch of available space to create distance between students.
- Establish student responsibilities to clean their personal area and materials/supplies with appropriate cleaning products provided by the District.
- Incorporate outdoor teaching when appropriate.
- Keep classroom doors open when possible to improve circulation and reduce the touching of door handles.
- Have access to disinfectant to sanitize high-touch and working surfaces and shared objects regularly.
- Limit the use of shared supplies when possible; shared supplies will be sanitized each time they are used.
If a student has displayed symptoms of COVID-19 and their temperature is 100° or higher, the school nurse will assess them to see if they need to be sent home.
As for closing an area of the school if a student, teacher, or faculty members is infected, the safety plans says, "schools must close off areas that are heavily used by the individual with a lab-confirmed COVID-19 case until the non-porous surfaces in those areas can be disinfected, unless more than three days have passed since that person was on campus."
For the entire list of guidelines, click here.