Struggling to deal with the surge in Omicron cases, Cobleskill-Richmondville is reaching out to Governor Kathy Hochul for help.
Superintendent Carl Mummenthey will ask the Governor to speed up calls for quarantines because the school is overwhelmed with the task.
“We’ve had to make thousands of calls [this school year],” Mr. Mummenthey said Monday. “We don’t have the resources.”
He had planned to join 23 other superintendents in Capital Region BOCES in asking Governor Hochul what criteria will be used to reduce mask-wearing.
“But things are changing so fast,” Mr. Mummenthey said. “One challenge is that Omicron is escalating in record numbers.”
If a student or staff member tests positive for COVID, C-R does the contact tracing, checking who the person was close to on a bus, in homeroom, cafeteria and classrooms.
The contact list goes to the Health Department, which decides who should be quarantined.
Although the state makes the calls to those who must quarantine, sometimes there’s a lag of three or four days before the state calls, meaning the person who should have quarantined is in school, possibly endangering others.
To reduce the time lag, C-R has been making the calls.
“We’re making a couple of hundred calls per week,” Mr. Mummenthey said. “We need the state to make the calls in a more timely manner.”
As C-R deals with the quarantine calls, the school district also received 1,392 test kits on Monday that will be free for all parents to take and administer at home.
Parents picked up the kits Tuesday and Wednesday and can also pick them up today, Thursday, from 4pm to 7pm at Golding School.
It was the state’s intention to distribute the kits before the holiday break ended, but C-R received its share on Monday, the first day school resumed.
If any kits remain after Thursday, C-R will use them in nurses’ offices for the test-to-stay-in-school protocol or for an initial diagnosis if a student or staff member is symptomatic. Both of those uses, however, require Health Department approval, which has not happened yet.