(Photo: Robin Rayne)
Georgia teachers in quarentine
On Wednesday, teachers in Georgia’s largest school district returned to their classrooms to begin in-person preparations for the coming fall semester. The next day, however, 260 district employees were prohibited from entering their schools.
The workers wither tested positive for the coronavirus or had been directly exposed to someone who had the virus. Sloan Roach, the spokeswoman for Gwinnett County Public Schools, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that most cases were tied to community spread.
“Given the number of [COVID-19] cases in Gwinnett, we would expect to see positives among our employees based on the community spread in our county,” Roach said in a statement. This week, Gwinnett County had the highest number of new coronavirus cases in the state; Georgia reported almost 200,000 cases and nearly 4,000 deaths to date.
The growing numbers due to the outbreak has complicated the county’s return to school plan; teachers and school administrators are dealing with the launch of a digital-only return. Georgia is not the only state dealing with the struggles of returning to school.
Across the United States, school districts have struggled to find the safest and most effective way to open doors to students this fall. However, spiking coronavirus case rates, especially in the Midwest and South, has complicated the reopening process.
In Florida, 35 of the state’s 67 school systems are scheduled to open classrooms. Texas mandated schools to reopen with some in-person instruction within two months of the state’s usual start date.
California is allowing schools to reopen as long as the applicable county is not on the state’s watch list for two weeks. New York City will reopen for in-person instruction if the city’s positive test rate remains falls below the required percentage for shut down.
Teachers are facing the struggle with returning to classrooms or teaching virtually, and some even quit their jobs because they had no option.
By: Maytinee Kramer
