GES : Update On COVID-19 Testing For Grades K-6

Press release from Gladwyne Elementary School:

2021-10-08

On October 8, 2021, Terry Quinlan, LMSD's Lead Supervisor of School Health and Student Safety, shared the update below on the state-sponsored Concentric by Ginkgo COVID-19 pool testing program, as well as on LMSD's ability to rapid-test students in grades K-6 for COVID-19.

POOL TESTING

Although LMSD had hoped to begin the pool testing next week, we have decided to pause the program for several reasons.

First, we did not reach the 60% threshold of consents in any school for students to participate. Lower levels of participation will not yield an accurate picture of COVID-19 infection in our schools.

Second, the staffing support that had been promised to augment our nurses in implementing the program was not satisfactory. We need to weigh the value of the pool testing program and its demands on our staff against their ongoing work on our other mitigation efforts across the District, including contact tracing, testing out of quarantine, testing vaccinated students who are identified as close contacts and testing students who become ill at school.

Third, it appears that vaccines are likely to be available for ages 5-11 in just a few weeks and that boosters are or will be available for other ages in the next month. Therefore, it seems prudent to devote more of our limited time and resources towards providing vaccination opportunities for our students and staff, rather than ramping up the pool testing program, which will quickly become less useful as more children are vaccinated.

RAPID TESTING

With parent/guardian consent, LMSD will continue to administer rapid tests in the following situations:

• Illness develops at school:We will call you if your child becomes or feels ill during the school day and test them in the health suite. REMINDER: Students may not come to school if they are symptomatic in accordance with the daily screener.

• Testing out of quarantine:Students who are quarantined as a result of an in-school exposure may return after 7 days of quarantine instead of 10 if they are tested on day 5-7 after exposure. Testing for out of quarantine is done outside of LMHS cafeteria daily between 3:00-5:00 p.m. and is not done during the school day.

• Testing for vaccinated close contacts: Students who are identified as in-school close contacts of a positive student may be tested on days 3-5 after exposure in accordance with recommendations of the MCOPH. This will be done in the health suite.

Because getting a test in school is likely more convenient than finding an outside test center and waiting for results, I urge you to complete the two steps needed for your child to undergo testing.

• First, you will need to log onto the PowerSchool Parent Portal and indicate whether you give your consent for your child to be tested at school. Please do this even if you have already turned in a paper consent for sports/activities rapid testing. I apologize for the redundancy, but we have recently worked with our Information Systems Department to streamline our process and safely store the consents for more efficiency.

• Directions for electronically signing the consent or opting out using PowerSchool eCollect can be found here and on the PowerSchool Parent Portal.

• Next, you will need to pre-register at https://register.pennrapidtest.org/ to obtain a QR code for testing.

• Directions for registering and obtaining your QR code are available here.

Thank you for participating in our rapid testing program and helping to keep our school community safe.

This press release was produced by Gladwyne Elementary School. The views expressed here are the author’s own.