TDSB will continue to alert parents to COVID-19 exposures in classrooms

Jan 14 2022, 4:12 pm

Toronto District School Board has released their return-to-school update and announcedĀ plans to continue reporting COVID-19 cases in schools.

Ontario students will head back to classrooms on January 17, and a number of changes await them. One particularly concerning change is that schools are no longer required to report confirmed COVID-19 cases to students and parents.

Ontario’s back-to-school plan would only alert parents to COVID-19 exposures in the school if 30% of the school population was absent for any reason. Despite no longer needing to, TDSB will continue to report confirmed COVID-19 cases to parents.

In a statement, the school board said that they would continue to alert affected classes and parents of COVID-19 exposures.

“At the TDSB, when schools become aware of a PCR or Rapid Antigen Test confirmed case of COVID-19, directly impacted classes will continue to be informed,” a news release by Director of Education Colleen Russell-Rawlins reads.

While they will report exposures and impacted classes, TDSB will no longer keep their COVID-19 monitoring page updated due to provincial reporting changes.

The school board also said they would be working with Toronto Public Health to determine if the 30% threshold for absences is low enough to report outbreaks.

“If absences exceed 30% of the school population, the TDSB is required to notify Toronto Public Health. We will continue to consult with TPH to determine if a lower threshold is more appropriate,” TDSB said in their back-to-school plan.

High school students may also be received to know that this upheaval in their education will not impact their grades.

“Marks will reflect work done up until December 17, 2021. Teachers will continue to assign learning tasks and culminating activities and provide feedback; however, this work will only be taken into consideration for Semester 1 final marks if it improves the student’s mark,” Russell-Rawlins said in a news release.

Brooke TaylorBrooke Taylor

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