The Star - News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area

Although transmission isn’t happening at Lake Roosevelt Schools, there are about 70 students quarantined because of either testing positive for COVID-19 or being exposed to it. 

Superintendent Paul Turner said Tuesday that roughly 15 students have tested positive for COVID-19, which has led to about 70 students being quarantined. 

He said the transmission isn’t happening at the school and that the schools’ screening process prior to entering the building has been successful. 

But that means students are still being exposed to Covid outside of the school. 

Quarantine lengths can vary, following state Department of Health protocols, depending on when someone was exposed, when they tested positive, when they tested negative, or if they’ve been vaccinated.

The positive tests and exposures have been spread out among grade levels, Turner said, rather than concentrated among older or younger students.

When a student tests positive, the school performs contact tracing to find out what other students that student may have spent time with, including siblings, and then who those students may have spent time with. 

Turner said there are different scenarios that can play out for students to be exposed to Covid.

Some parents have been upset about their student having to stay home, he noted.

In addition to the students, three staff members are quarantined, which could become a problem if it spreads.

“We can survive so far,” Turner said, “but I’ve been hearing some of our neighboring school districts are having real problems. If that comes into our area, we may be hurting.”

He said the district is looking for people willing to substitute at the school. Aside from needing to pass background checks, the substitutes wouldn’t need to meet other qualifications, such as having college degrees, he said.

Teachers who had been exposed to Covid but didn’t test positive could quarantine from home, but still teach through video on a computer. A substitute in that scenario wouldn’t need to teach the class, but simply to be in the classroom to monitor the students.

In volleyball, the only indoor sport currently, a game on Tuesday was canceled due to LR volleyball players either being exposed to Covid or testing positive. They will test again soon to see if Thursday’s game will take place.

Other than that, LR’s other teams are still ready to play; however, the Dayton-Waitsburg football team canceled last Friday’s game due to their own Covid concerns.