VEEDERSBURG — Southeast Fountain Superintendent Dan Foster and members of the school board toured the Fountain Central campus Tuesday ahead of the official start to the 2020-21 school year.
Those in attendance received a first-hand view of what the interior of Fountain Central Jr.-Sr. High School and the adjacent Southeast Fountain Elementary School would look like to students returning from an extended summer Wednesday due the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
Improved nurses’ facilities, rearranged floor plans, new water fountains and signs reminding students to practice social distancing were highlighted.
“Reopening schools while mitigating risk — that’s what we have tried to do,” Foster said.
Nursing facilities have greatly improved, several board members voiced Tuesday, saying the previous nurse’s office could be likened to a closet.
But now a large room containing two beds separated by curtains to treat and quarantine students who potentially test positive for COVID-19, or show symptoms during the school day, mark the leading medical effort put together by the corporation.
“They just redid all of this,” board member Kim Sowers said. “This all happened since we decided to do it in May.”
The nurse’s office is large enough to allow ample space between treatment areas, waiting areas and faculty desks, which have plexiglass partitions lining their edges.
Plexiglass dividers have been installed in a number of areas throughout the facilities. Most teachers’ desks, offices and counters were lined with the “invisible” barrier.
However, the district cannot force any student or employee to be tested for COVID-19. Instead, employees have been trained to recognize symptoms of the virus.
Coronavirus screenings will be a daily process during the school day, Foster said, as students and staff will be trained to identify symptoms, which include fever, loss of appetite, fatigue, loss of smell, shortness of breath, cough, coughing up sputum and muscle pain.
Screenings in the home will also be encouraged, with board members calling help from parents in the screening process “crucial.”
“We really are going to have to have some assistance from parents, especially with the younger kids,” Foster said.
Students who test positive for COVID-19 will be excluded from school, and requirements to return will be much like that of influenza.
The district has also purchased Google Chromebooks to bolster its take-home laptop numbers.
Though families living in rural areas of Fountain County struggle with internet capabilities, the devices were purchased in case remote learning becomes necessary in the coming weeks or months.
“We’ve had enough devices for K-12 but they had never gone home,” Foster said. “According to a survey we did in late May, first of June, we still have about 40 percent that don’t have reliable internet, which could mean no internet or they’re trying to use cell phone hotspots. And if you have three kids in your house trying to work off of that, somebody’s not going to be able to.”
Cases for the laptops will be provided for take-home use.
