Tea Area schools finds way to keep parents informed of COVID-19 cases without violating privacy concerns

A metro area school district is taking a unique approach to informing its community about the scope of COVID-19 cases in each of its schools thanks to a new virus mitigation assessment chart focused on addressing mitigation efforts with the public.

While some school districts have opted not to inform the broader community at large or media about active positive cases on campuses, the Tea Area School District in Lincoln County has an area on its website for parents to look at the spread of cases in each of its five schools. 

The district identified its first case of the new school year on the first day back Wednesday, Superintendent Jennifer Lowery said. The case was at Legacy Elementary.

She would not say whether the person was a student or staff member, but added that almost all five schools sit at mitigation level yellow, meaning anywhere from one to five active positive cases should have been on the campus by the time school started, regardless of whether the person actually stepped foot into the building.

"We felt it was important for people to have a perspective on what was occurring, while still, to the best of our abilities, keeping people's privacy," Lowery said. 

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The approach is even different than that of the state health department. 

As of Thursday, the department announced 19 school districts across South Dakota had at least one positive case already, with less than 40 COVID-19 cases among students, teachers and staff overall.  

The department is expected to start posting the number of cases among students and staff on its COVID-19 website Monday, but won't be releasing the names of the schools where those cases occur unless a cluster happens, state epidemiologist Josh Clayton.

While parents of those impacted are often notified by letters about positive cases and potential close contact exposure to the virus, the data on the website will only be at a statewide level so "there's some understanding of total number of cases, total number of school districts," he said.

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The Tea school district's response chart is based off of information from the CDC and the American Pediatrics Association, and resembles a tiered approach from the state health department, Lowery said. 

But state and other local school officials have previously said there's no clear threshold or hard and fast rule for when a district may need to make a change its approach to activity attendance or close a campus.

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For Tea Area schools, though, the tiered approach was adapted to show more about how, why and when schools may move from level to level as cases occur, and it can only be approved for edits by the school board if it needs to be adjusted, she said. 

Lowery said the district was receiving multiple questions from parents about how they were going to know about cases, and how decisions about things like potential school closures would be made. 

As a response, the district came up with a team to develop a document more detailed and easy to understand for the general public, she said. 

Like other districts, Tea Area school officials are still sending out those positive case and close contact letters with the help of the state health department. But giving the public access to a clear mitigation chart can help families make the best decisions possible, she said. 

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The only area Lowery said she anticipates major changes to the plan may be on how student cohorts work, meaning how they limit the movement between classes to help mitigate the spread, she said.

"These cases are happening everywhere," Lowery said. "You just don't know about them, and we're working hand-in-hand with people to do the very best for our kids. Superintendents have been making decisions at this level for a very long time, and we're taking this extremely serious."

Here's a look at the levels as follows, with some of the highlights from each:

While Lowery can move a campus up a level as needed, she cannot move a campus back down a level without going through the district's COVID-19 response team and the school board, she said. 

Legacy Elementary was at green before the confirmed case this week, she said.

"We're not perfect, and we don't have all the answers," she said. "But we are providing information and opportunities for everyone to receive an education."

The district has also created the Tea Area Online Academy for students if someone is in quarantine, or chooses to go into quarantine, that way they can still receive instruction, Lowery said. 

"This is not new to us," Lowery said. "But the level of concern by all involved in understanding the daily risk is new to a lot of people, and everybody has to make their own decisions for their families based on their own circumstances."

See the district's full mitigation response chart below.