Health and Covid-19 Information

Wed, 09/01/2021 - 6:02pm

COVID-19 Self-Screening Symptoms and Exposure Reminders

Parents/guardians should keep their children home if they are experiencing symptom(s) associated with any communicable disease, including COVID-19. In addition, parents/guardians are to perform the following COVID-19 health check every day before the student leaves home.

A student should NOT come to school with any of these symptoms:

  • fever of 100.4 degrees or higher

  • sore throat

  • cough

  • difficulty breathing

  • diarrhea or vomiting

  • new onset of severe headache (especially with fever), or

  • new loss of taste or smell

For persons with chronic conditions such as asthma, the symptoms should represent a change from baseline.

Children exhibiting symptoms of COVID-19 may not attend school and must be kept home.

Students exhibiting symptoms of COVID-19 need to be evaluated for COVID-19 or an alternate medical diagnosis. They may not return to school until medically cleared. In addition, students with symptoms of any communicable disease may not attend school until evaluated and medically treated.

COVID Protocols - COVID Dashboard - https://covid.hcpss.org/

Quarantining Procedures

Contact tracing is handled by the Howard County Health Department (HCHD), with support from and in coordination with the HCPSS Office of Health Services. Only unvaccinated students and adults who are identified as close contacts must quarantine. Vaccinated students and staff will not be required to quarantine unless they receive a positive test or are displaying symptoms, however they will be expected to monitor their symptoms closely for the 14 days.

Details on quarantining requirements for unvaccinated students and staff can be found online.