COVID Q&A with Supt. Joe Nelson- following guidelines on information sharing

COVID Q&A with Supt. Joe Nelson

Clarion-Goldfield-Dows Superintendent Joe Nelson says the district continues to learn and adapt as they offer education in the midst of COVID. He recently announced that the district’s policy on reporting COVID cases has changed. He answered some questions about that topic.

At the beginning of the school year, parents were receiving emails notifying them about COVID positive cases in the schools that specified which building the case was in. Such notification is no longer being sent. Why has that changed?

The Iowa Department of Education has recently instructed schools that they should NOT send out a notification of a positive COVID-19 case or notification of students or staff being sent home with symptoms or close contacts, unless it is six or more at one time. (See the guidelines below). It is too easy to identify who the individual or individuals may be if it is less than six people, which becomes a violation of their privacy. 

What is the new policy regarding communication about positive cases in the district?  What kind of communication about positive cases can parents expect going forward? Will there be notification if a certain case threshold is reached?

We will contact the parents of students who have been identified as a close contact.

We know this is confusing sometimes and we encourage you to contact the school at any time for clarification.  We realize that there may often be a lot of misinformation out there so we appreciate it when parents contact the school directly with questions so they can get the accurate information. 

Some school districts, like Hampton-Dumont, are still reporting new cases, though not numbers and buildings, while others (larger ones like Iowa City) have a full-fledged COVID dashboard run by their district. Could CGD do anything like those districts?

Every school district in Iowa has their own COVID-19 Return to Learn and Communication plan. Within our own county, there are many similarities and differences between each of the three different districts’ plans. I respect the difficult COVID related decisions each Superintendent and School Board are being required to make right now. That said, I do receive feedback each week from people that ask me if I’m aware of the specific details in others school’s plans. In the end, we’ve chosen to provide the safest learning and working environment for our students and staff while also protecting the privacy of all involved. 

If parents are not being notified about cases anymore, do you feel they will still be able to make informed decisions about the safety of sending their child(ren) to school?

I’m convinced our CGD schools are the safest place for kids right now. We have a workforce of 175 dedicated employees that include two outstanding nurses focused on student health and safety. Each of our employees are dedicated to the District’s safety protocols that include mandatory PPE, temperature screenings, and frequent sanitation. 

Guidelines on information sharing for COVID-19 cases in schools

The Iowa Dept of Education (DOE) and Public Health (IDPH) released the following guidelines on September 16, 2020. These are the guidelines that Superintendent Nelson is citing above.

Below, we provide summary guidance and considerations for sharing case information related to school settings.

Schools and Local Public Health - Sharing Information with the Public:

•Federal and state laws generally prohibit public health and school officials from disclosing identifying information about positive COVID-19 cases in a public manner.

•Local public health officials should not release information to the public about cases at school settings, similar to how they do not release this information for outbreaks at businesses. See confidentiality provisions in Iowa Code Section 139A.3(2).

•Schools should work to notify the school community experiencing cases in order to protect students’ health and should follow long-standing requirements for infectious disease notifications.

•If schools choose to share case information further with the public, such as via public dashboards, they should make considerations to protect the confidentiality of students in the school setting:

•Release case counts only when there are 100 or more total students in the student population at a location

•Schools that have no cases can report zero cases

•Schools with counts of 6 or more cases can release specific case counts

•Schools with 5 or fewer cases should not provide a specific count, but can confirm there are cases within the school population

•No other demographic identifiers should be included in the school-level release

•Local public health and school officials should contact their legal counsel in determining the nature and scope of information to provide in order to find the appropriate balance of protecting the public while protecting the privacy of individual students and staff, as well as the health of the educational community as a whole.

Editorial commentary:

The state teacher’s union, the Iowa State Education Association (ISEA), has pointed out that the above are “guidelines” and only that. “Let’s be clear, this is simply guidance not a directive that must be followed,” said ISEA President Mike Beranek about the new IDPH and DOE direction. “Second, it is not illegal for a school district to share data with Iowa COVID-19 In Our Schools dashboard [which tracks COVID cases in schools], as long as it doesn’t violate the privacy of an individual. We applaud those school districts that continue to update communities with their own dashboards and websites as well … The ISEA believes the IDPH and the [I]DOE have an obligation and urgency to promote more transparency during this crisis rather than less.”