Week 2 of classes sees big COVID positivity rate jump in Modesto, Turlock school districts
Turlock and Modesto school districts reported 60 and 84 COVID-19 cases, respectively, from their second week of in-person instruction.
The numbers reflect a rise in cases in Stanislaus County and across the country caused by the more transmissible delta variant. Modesto City Schools’ positivity rate doubled over the first two weeks of school. The positivity rate at Turlock Unified School District more than quadrupled, though its first week of school only included three days.
Local public health officials will defer to the California Department of Public Health on setting a threshold for shutting down a classroom or school like last year, said Maria Blanco, COVID-19 public information officer for Stanislaus County Public Health. State officials have not provided a cap this year, Blanco said, and Stanislaus County won’t set its own guidelines.
None of the schools have positivity rates near last year’s threshold of 5% to close a school for 14 days.
“We’re working with schools, monitoring transmission on campus, and then we’ll work with the schools to see uninterrupted ongoing transmission and look at extending who is quarantined,” Blanco said.
Turlock Unified School District confirmed 60 cases — 51 among students and nine among staff — via an update Monday afternoon.
The cases caused 585 close contacts, or 585 students and staff exposed and potentially in quarantine. A person is identified as a close contact if they spent at least 15 minutes within six feet of the person who tested positive over a 24-hour period.
Vaccinated students and staff do not have to quarantine or be tested if they don’t show symptoms, so not all of the 585 exposed people needed to miss school days.
Modesto City Schools reported 84 COVID-19 cases among students and staff last week.
This translates to a 0.267% positivity rate for the second week of full in-person learning, and brings the district’s total number of cases the first two weeks of school to 118. The district reported a 0.109% positivity rate the first week.
Modesto City Schools did not provide the number of close contact exposures caused by these cases. Spokeswoman Krista Noonan said the district is “committed to protecting health privacy information, and therefore, we do not release the number of close contacts.”
“We promptly disclose the number of confirmed COVID+ cases at our school sites across the district via our dashboard,” Noonan said in an email. “Plus, we actively adhere to our disclosure requirements to promptly provide families with notifications and instructions if their student has been identified as a close contact, in addition to notifying school site staff if there’s been an exposure on a school campus.”
In an email Thursday morning, Blanco said public health officials “are not aware of any reason the numbers of close contacts that result from exposure to COVID-19 could not be provided.”
Noonan said the range of close contacts an infected person might expose in a school setting depends on classroom configuration and the distance over which the interaction took place.
Key takeaways by school
Turlock reported cases at all schools in the district except for Roselawn Continuation and eCademy Charter at Crane.
There were 34 student and staff cases at elementary schools, six at middle schools and 19 at high schools. Turlock High School had the most student cases at 12, which led to 257 exposures.
In Modesto, Fremont Elementary and Open Plan reported the highest positivity rate for the second week in a row. Four student cases were reported the first week, and eight the second. The school’s positivity rate is 1.252%.
Of the new cases in Modesto City Schools, 40 were at elementary schools, 10 were from middle schools and 34 were from high schools. Positivity rates for all elementary and middle schools were over 0.3% each.
Asked if Modesto City Schools planned to implement additional safety measures when positive cases are identified, Noonan said the district “already has many robust health and safety measures in place at all of our sites. This includes indoor mask requirements for all individuals on campuses, enhanced cleaning, sanitizing and disinfecting processes, increased ventilation and air purification systems, etc.”
Blanco said public health officials are encouraging schools to depend on the safety measures in place, including isolation, quarantine, testing and masking, to stop transmission.
“During a large surge, we expect many positives to be identified,” Blanco said. “It doesn’t necessarily mean that there is transmission and that we need more mitigation.”
School leaders do not yet have information on how many teachers are vaccinated, Noonan said. Modesto City Schools is creating a secure system to track staff vaccination status in compliance with Gov. Gavin Newsom’s requirement that teachers must be vaccinated or submit to weekly testing by Oct. 15.
What happens to students in quarantine?
Turlock established a free COVID-19 testing program this week to help students stay in classrooms after interacting with someone who tested positive. With parent consent, exposed students can be tested on-campus, receive results in 15 minutes and, if they test negative, return to class.
Modesto City Schools is working on setting up a similar program, Noonan said. School officials have conducted COVID-19 tests at some schools as needed, with consent from parents or guardians, she said.
Modesto City Schools posted online resources in various subjects for students in grades TK-6 to access while staying home due to potential exposure.
Grade-level packets review content students have already learned, according to the district’s website. School officials are encouraging students to spend at least 20 minutes a day on each subject.
Seventh- through 12th-grade students will either receive assignments related to daily in-class instruction, or a packet of assignments instead.
Modesto City Schools reports weekly COVID-19 case updates from the week prior on Tuesdays at www.mcs4kids.com/district/covid-19. Turlock Unified reports weekly COVID-19 case updates from the week prior on Mondays at www.turlock.k12.ca.us/dashboard.
This story was originally published August 26, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
