August 23, 2020
Dear Prince Families:
Our campus reopening plan’s policies and procedures continue to provide the framework for initiatives like social distancing and disinfecting that have helped keep our school open. My ongoing virtual meetings with other heads of school in the Georgia Independent School Association, in addition to in-person meetings with local educational leaders (my most recent was last Thursday with Oconee County’s superintendent and the other independent heads of school in our service area), have confirmed we have implemented and upheld the “best practices” employed by other quality schools that have also remained open. While not a popular decision, schools that have required the use of masks are seeing lower infection rates than those who have not.
Our cooperation as a united family-school community remains critical in preventing the spread of the virus. Please, continue to monitor your student’s health and do not send your son or daughter to school if they have a fever. Once students are on campus, we are taking temperatures of 15-18% of the student population, daily, using a predetermined list to avoid redundancy. We are the only school in the county, private or public, taking this precaution. We have become efficient in this process, and the students have gotten used to this procedure/additional layer of protection.
We have learned from other schools in Georgia with students who have tested positive for COVID-19 that “contact tracing” results in an average of fifteen to twenty students being placed in quarantine. The principals and school nurse have already been trained in contact tracing and have practiced this function with three students who were sent home these first two weeks with gastrointestinal issues (all tested negative for COVID-19). We, too, have concluded that a student at PACS who tests positive for COVID-19 would result in fifteen to twenty students being quarantined. When we do have a positive student COVID-19 test, our team is trained to conduct parent notifications, deeply disinfect the campus, conduct hybrid instruction, monitor students’ health while off-campus, obtain medical clearances for students to return, and reintegrate students back into the traditional classroom. Thus far, we have not had any students test positive for COVID-19.
The CDC has repeatedly stated that masks reduce the transmission of the water droplets we all emit when we speak. The advice and counsel from other heads of school who have kept their schools open, and that of our medical advisory team, has overwhelmingly advocated for the continued use of masks. Faced with the challenges associated with wearing masks versus increasing the potential for spreading the virus, we will continue to err on the side of caution. Our team is repeatedly revisiting our safety level (the use of masks in particular), and we will reduce to Safety Level II as soon conditions warrant it (within the past week, Georgia was rated number one out of fifty states for new infections; fortunately, we are now on a downward trend).
Last week, I received six spirited emails from parents expressing their dissatisfaction with my decision to stay at Level III, and I responded to each with a phone call to listen to their concerns and compassionately communicate our decision on why we were remaining at Safety Level III. For the sake of convenience, comfort, and for those students with preexisting conditions that makes wearing a mask problematic, we prefer NOT to wear masks. However, our system is working, and we are moving into week three. Thank you for your continued support and cooperation; together, we will continue to keep our students in school and reap the dividends inherent with being in a traditional school environment.
With warm regards and in His service,
