With large portions of its staff and student body absent from school on Monday, all Adna School District students have been temporarily shifted to remote learning until Friday, Oct. 29.
“It’s not a decision we made lightly at all, but it's in the best interest of everybody involved,” said Superintendent Thad Nelson.
The district’s two schools, Adna Elementary School and Adna Middle/High School, were closed to in-person learning effective Tuesday, Oct. 19 after the district recorded 28% of Adna Middle/High School’s 377 students and 19% of Adna Elementary School’s 250 students were absent from school on Monday — a 10% increase in absences across the board compared to the average numbers for the rest of the year so far, according to Nelson.
“Those numbers include kids that are sick with the flu, kids that are home with COVID that we know for a fact, that are required to quarantine for close contact, those are all absences,” said Nelson. “We’re not taking out any, it’s just all students that were gone that day and all students that parents hadn’t called in yet or hadn’t cleared.”
District officials first became concerned about the number of absences on Friday, but decided to wait until Monday to see if the increase was an anomaly leading up to the weekend.
But when the percentage points stayed the same on Monday, district officials contacted the Lewis County Public Health, which recommended the district shift to remote learning for 10 to 14 days.
“We’re just trying to keep everyone’s health and safety in mind,” said Nelson. “That gives us time to do a thorough deep-clean of both buildings, just making sure that we’re well prepared and that we’re safer when we come back.”
When asked if there was any reason the district would delay the return to in-person learning, Nelson said, “it would depend on the information we got. Our intent is to go back on the 29th.”
Part of the reason for the temporary shift to remote learning was the high number of staff members at the Middle/High school — 25% as of Monday, according to a district press release — that have been affected by COVID-19 quarantine requirements. And due to the impact of COVID-19 on the district’s certified and classified staff, the district has had difficulty finding substitutes to fill in.
The state Department of Health (DOH) requires unvaccinated staff and students who have been exposed to COVID-19 to quarantine for seven days if they haven’t developed symptoms and have had a negative COVID-19 test. Without a negative COVID-19 test, the quarantine is required to last at least 10 days. Anyone who develops symptoms must quarantine for a full 14 days.
Fully vaccinated staff and students do not need to quarantine under DOH rules, but they should be tested three to five days after exposure and then quarantine if they test positive.
Nelson has confirmed that all of the Adna School District’s 77 staff members have complied with the state’s vaccine mandate by either presenting vaccination information or receiving accommodations for an approved exemption to the mandate.
