What the latest COVID-19 spike means for school reopenings in Sacramento, Placer, El Dorado

As coronavirus infection rates increase and Sacramento County falls back into the state’s most restrictive tier of risk, many students who hoped to return to campus in November will have to wait several more weeks.

Sacramento County Public Health official Dr. Olivia Kasirye said schools that are already open – including private schools and some campuses in the Folsom Cordova Unified School District – will not be affected by the recent spike in infection rates and may proceed with classroom instruction.

Schools that planned to open next week, though, and “those planning to open later in November will have to put their plans on hold,” she said.

Elementary schools are able to move forward with applying for reopening waivers and many schools are doing so, Kasirye said.

“That gives us time to work our way back into the red tier,” Kasirye said.

Placer and El Dorado counties were demoted from the orange tier to the red tier on Tuesday. That move does not impact school reopenings.

Schools moving forward with reopening plans

Folsom Cordova Unified will reopen schools on Thursday for students in grades TK to fifth. The district transitioned to a hybrid model this week, with nearly 5,000 elementary aged students beginning in-person classes for two-and-a-half hours, four days a week. The students who are returning are spread out at 20 schools across Folsom and Rancho Cordova. Families who chose to continue online learning will continue though the district’s virtual academy.

Teachers and parents rallied in front of the district office on Thursday, calling for more transparency and better safety measures to protect students and staff from the virus.

Most Sacramento districts won’t reopen now

Natomas Unified plans to reopen its campuses Jan. 4. Previously, the district had intended to reopen campuses on Dec. 14 if the county remained in the orange tier for two weeks. With the county returning to the purple tier on Tuesday, that is becoming more unlikely.

“We learned in April that the first week back of something so new is tiring for families and staff,” read a statement from the district. “If we can start December 14th, two weeks of rest follows. Plus, managers and other staff can make necessary adjustments to plans over winter break. As of today, based on Sacramento County’s status, January 4th is looking to be the likeliest start date.”

Elk Grove Unified announced that if Sacramento County had a lower infection rate by Nov. 3, and moved from the state’s red tier to the orange tier, students would have begun returning to campus on Nov. 17 through Jan. 7. But as the county returns to purple, the district will continue full distance learning and will reopen schools in January with a Concurrent Instructional Model.

San Juan Unified announced their plan to return to campus on Jan. 5.

With schools and school districts across the Sacramento region now scheduled to reopen campuses in early January, Sacramento County will need to return to the red tier by Dec. 22 — just says before Christmas, a time when many families gather to celebrate the holiday or their time off.

Returning to school in January is unlikely, predicts Dr. Dean Blumberg, chief of pediatric infectious diseases at UC Davis Children’s Hospital.

“The increases we saw (with COVID-19) were before or around holidays,” Blumberg said. “The incubation period (of the virus) is between two to four weeks, so we will see the effects of Thanksgiving right around Christmas.”

Do schools spread the virus?

Kasirye said there have there have been only a few COVID-19 cases related to school employees and students, and none of them appear to have been passed from one person to another at a school.

Students and staff who have tested positive so far appear to have gotten the virus elsewhere, typically from family — a key fact, especially as holidays approach.

“We have had a few reports of cases (among people at schools), but no transmission within the school,” said Kasirye. “Exposure is from outside of the schools. We have worked with different schools. My assessment is the cohort system is working well.”

Epidemiologists in Placer County, where schools have been open for weeks, found that it’s not schools or nursing homes driving the surge, but rather more people passing the disease to household members as well as a growth in large gatherings. Rocklin Unified saw a spike in cases this past week, reporting that 12 students were infected. The district did not identify a cause.

The majority of people who caught the virus in October reported being in close contact with someone who already had it. The next largest cause of spread was people who live in a household where another resident or family member has been infected.

Twenty percent of new cases in Placer County were generated from large gatherings, the report said.

This story was originally published November 10, 2020 at 12:22 PM with the headline "What the latest COVID-19 spike means for school reopenings in Sacramento, Placer, El Dorado."