The East Greenbush Central School District was notified today that a Genet Elementary School student and a Goff Middle School student have tested positive for COVID-19. The two cases are related, however the Goff student is full remote and has not been in school this year. The district, in coordination with the Rensselaer County Health Department, has completed its contact tracing at Genet and identified 24 students and seven employees as contacts who must enter mandatory quarantine at home.
All families impacted have been contacted by school administrators and given instructions related to mandatory quarantine. The quarantined students do not need to be tested for COVID-19 unless exhibiting symptoms or advised by a healthcare provider.
As contact tracing has been completed and additional cleaning and disinfecting of the entire school is scheduled for this weekend, Genet will be open for in-person learning on Monday and operate on a normal A Day schedule.
This case, which is unrelated to the Genet employee who tested positive earlier this week, involves a full day special education class. Because the class is full day special education, the students attend school four days a week. Although the class was generally self-contained, additional contacts have been identified from their contact with the infected student on either Monday, November 16, which was an A Day, or Tuesday, November 17, which was a B Day.
The affected class will switch to full remote starting Monday. All other students identified as contacts will be offered tutoring services provided by the district.
Parents of the students who have been quarantined have been asked to complete the COVID-19 Screening Form daily and report any symptoms of COVID-19, including fever (greater than 100 degrees), cough, shortness of breath, fatigue, chills, muscle pain, headache, sore throat, new loss of taste or smell, congestion or runny nose, nausea or vomiting, or diarrhea.
The district is also asking families to voluntarily keep any siblings at home through the end of their quarantine out of an abundance of caution.
Genet will be thoroughly cleaned and disinfected this weekend including all classrooms and common areas across the building. The cleaning and disinfecting will be performed by school custodial staff and an outside company contracted through Questar III BOCES.
In the event that further developments occur or if additional information regarding this matter becomes available to our school district, the school community will be kept informed.
Those with questions are advised to call the county health department directly at 518-270-2655 or contact the district’s COVID-19 Coordinator at Columbia High School at 518-207-2180.