HOUSTON COUNTY, Ga. — It's the first day of school for the district with the most students in Central Georgia.
Houston County Schools Superintendent Mark Scott says over half of their nearly 30,000 total students are returning to in-person classes.
"The fact that over 75% of our parents are sending their kids to school for face-to-face instruction says a lot and we don't take that confidence for granted," Scott said.
He says they have plans in place if a COVID-19 case happens.
"It would be our process to immediately isolate those people to screen them, to make sure that they do in fact have the symptoms and we would treat them as a positive case until we can get them screened and then get the proper assistance from the medical field," Scott said.
Students who test positive would quarantine for 14 days while the district and health department work to trace those who were exposed.
"It is a clear expectation for our classrooms to have seating charts, so that should a student become ill, we would be able to identify those students who, even if they're 6-foot social distance, we'd know who was sitting around that student. We've also put into place protocols where cohorts when possible, where students are staying in like groups throughout the school day," Scott said.
Those in contact would quarantine and work remotely until their 14-day period is up. The protocols are similar for their nearly 4,000 employees returning to campus.
"They would be required to either meet the quarantine guidelines or isolation guidelines based on what situation it is and the district would then secure a substitute and work with that teacher to make sure that the classroom is covered," Scott said.
Scott says less than 2% of their teacher population has been affected by quarantine as they start school, assuring parents they're keeping a close eye on all COVID-19 outcomes.
"We just ask that they give us a little bit of grace and flexibility as we have to change processes and procedures because we know the first day some of the things that we've planned will not go as planned and we'll have to make some adjustments," Scott said.
If a student does test positive, they will get excused absences during quarantine if they can not complete their work remotely.