School Reopening: COVID-19 Report Card

School Reopening: COVID-19 Report Card: New York State recently launched the COVID-19 Report Card. This new online tool tracks the positive COVID tests of all on-site students, teachers and other school faculty at all New York State public schools. Data reported on the site includes anyone who is physically present in the building or on school grounds in any capacity. The state’s data is collected as part of a contact tracing effort. Its information is either shared by the student’s parent or guardian, schools teachers and other staff, or communicated by the local health department.

You can search by individual school or by school district. A district search breaks out the individual school’s within your district. This search result for the Byram Hills School Central School District (CSD) shows that one “onsite” person at the Wampus School has tested positive for COVID-19. That person is currently the only positive test in the Byram Hills School District that includes 2,028 onsite enrolled students plus teachers and staff. The COVID-19 Report Card represents the aggregate population of students and school employees and does not provide any further population brackdown.

As of Monday, September 14, this positive test is the only one currently reported on New York States COVID-19 Report Card from any of our area’s schools. Including, Chappaqua CSD, Bedford CSD, Mt. Pleasant CSD, Somers CSD, North Salem CSD, Pleasantville United Free School District (UFSD) or the Katonah-Lewisboro UFSD.

Subsequent to the recent outbreak at the State University of New York at Oneonta which resulted in the college sending students home and switching to remote learning, the New York State developed a SUNY COVID-19 Case Tracker  covering all 64 of the state’s colleges and universities. The outbreak which resulted in over 300 positive tests was chalked up to student parties but students criticized the school for not requiring stunts to be tested upon arrival for the fall semester.  The SUNY COVID tracker shows 106 new positives over the last seven days from over 18,000 campus administered tests. COVID activity at SUNY schools may have significant relevance in our area as many local students attend New York State schools.