• Please remember that effective communication between the school nurse and parents is extremely important to maintain the safety of our buildings during the COVID-19 pandemic.  If a parent , sibling or household contact  is experiencing symptoms and presumed or  tests positive, for COVID-19 please notify the school nurse immediately. The COVID-19 protocol can be complicated  and the school nurse can assist   you with concerns or questions and guide you on what to do. We need good effort by all to keep our buildings open.

• Chick fil a restaurant night tonight from 5:00 - 8:00 pm via drive thru

• Please call either school office by Friday, November 20 if you would like to switch from in-person learning to virtual learning for trimester 2.  This would take effect on Monday, November 30.

• Monday, November 23, is our last day before Thanksgiving Break.

• The past few days we have re-evaluated our classroom set-ups and made some changes in several rooms so that we can further social distance our students. Please know that we are doing everything we can to remain open and teaching in-person while making sure our students, faculty, and staff are as safe as possible.

• In spite of our commitment to keep students in school, there may be a need to decide rather quickly about temporary remote learning in certain grade levels or school wide due to lack of staffing or quarantining. Teachers should have shared with you and students their fully remote schedules so that if the need does arise, there won’t be confusion as to how or when to log on for virtual learning.

• No.  Thanksgiving break does mark the end of the first trimester and a notification was sent out asking parents to decide if they would like to switch to remote learning for trimester 2.  That would begin November 30.  If you would like to switch to virtual learning for trimester 2 just call either school office and let us know by this Friday, November 20.  There is a possibility that if COVID cases continue to rise we will need to make the decision to go virtual at some point between thanksgiving and Christmas.  We are in close communication with the clermont county board of health who keep us up to date on numbers and whether or not schools should remain in-person. 

• There really isn’t a criteria for all schools switching to remote learning.  We are in close contact with the Clermont Health Department as we report our positive COVID cases to them.  If the county goes to purple status and the health department recommends that schools go virtual because they are seeing the spread occuring in schools, then we would move to virtual learning for a period of at least a week, and most probably two weeks.  If we as a school cannot maintain proper staffing due COVID cases we would have to go virtual for at least a two week period of time.  This could also occur if a large percentage of our student population(40 - 50% or more) tests positive and/or is quarantined due to being a close contact.  The last scenario that requires us to go to virtual learning is if the governor mandates it.
• The policies in place for K-12 across the state appear to be doing a good job of minimizing spread within school buildings. Are there any considerations to start having preschoolers wear masks or increase distancing due to increased community spread? I know there are some schools in the area that are having anyone 3+ wear masks even though it is not mandated at the state-level.
• St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Preschool closely follows the guidelines set up by the Ohio Department of Jobs and Family Services, the Ohio Board of Health, and the Clermont County Board of Health. Per the requirements of these agencies we have not required social distancing and mask wearing by our children in the preschool. We have found that younger children have a hard time wearing their masks correctly, leaving them on, and keeping their hands off their faces (whether they have their masks on or not). We allow parents to choose whether they want their children to wear masks to school and follow their wishes, so some of our preschoolers have masks on and some do not. We also do not socially distance in the classroom because one of the main reasons children are attending preschool is to learn to appropriately interact with each other. We know that there is a risk that a whole class will have to quarantine if an individual in the class becomes positive for COVID. By keeping our class sizes small and never mixing classes we are trying to minimize the number of children that would have to quarantine if a student becomes ill. As of today we have not had any preschoolers or staff members positive for COVID.
• As COVID Cases become more prevalent the Ohio Department of Jobs and Family Services and the Boards of Health may change their mask requirements for preschoolers, and we will carefully follow whatever guidelines are required of us.