GREENFIELD — A Greenfield Central Junior High School student has tested positive for COVID-19, a school official reported Thursday, the first day of classes for the 2020-21 academic year.
Harold Olin, superintendent of Greenfield-Central Schools, said he sent an email to GCJHS parents Thursday afternoon informing them of the case. The email said the Hancock County Health Department notified the school corporation that a student who attended part of the school day had tested positive for the virus.
After becoming aware of the test result, the school corporation enacted its Positive COVID-19 Test Protocol, the email continues. That included immediately isolating the student in an identified area in the junior high clinic. School personnel collected the student’s schedule, including transportation and extra-curricular activities, to determine which students or staff would be considered close contacts. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention defines a close contact as anyone within 6 feet of an infected person for more than 15 minutes.
Greenfield-Central’s reentry plan states staff and students who test positive for COVID-19 and have symptoms can return to school after isolating at home for 10 days from the date symptoms begin; are fever free without fever-reducing medication for 72 hours; and other symptoms have improved for 72 hours.
Those who test positive but have no symptoms will isolate at home for 10 days from the day the test was taken. If they don’t develop symptoms, they may return 10 days after the test. If they develop symptoms, their isolation time starts on the first day of those symptoms.
The plan calls for close contacts to quarantine for 14 days before returning to school and to follow protocols for the various symptomatic scenarios.
The plan is available in its entirety at https://www.gcsc.k12.in.us/.
Olin said the school corporation’s nurse; a nurse the corporation hired to address COVID-19 protocols; and the junior high’s health assistant are all performing contact tracing and notifying the county health department of the steps being taken.
“We do have a lot of professionals working on that in terms of doing the contact tracing and contacting the families,” Olin said.
Greenfield-Central offered students the ability to attend school in person at the start of the year or remotely from home.
On Friday, junior high students who were determined not to be close contacts of the student who tested positive will be able to continue to attend in person.
“Tomorrow we will carry on,” Olin said Thursday evening. “Obviously we will have fewer students with us, but we’ll continue with what we’re doing.”
Much has been learned about the novel coronavirus since the pandemic started last March, when it wasn’t uncommon for an entire school corporation to shut down because of one case, Olin said.
“There were a lot of people in school today who would have nothing to worry about,” Olin said. “That’s why we have protocols in place.”
