Dear Parkway Community,

Last night, our Board of Education reviewed and voted to approve our health plan for the upcoming school year. As previously communicated, we will now apply our standard Communicable Disease policy in response to COVID. This means we will treat COVID cases similarly to other infectious diseases in school.

As we return to school on Monday, August 22, here is what you can expect:

• Face coverings will no longer be required of students, staff or visitors and we will no longer utilize a building-level threshold to determine if students, staff and visitors must wear a face covering. However, students, staff and visitors may choose to wear face coverings to address their own individual health needs. We expect our community to be respectful of the choices of others.

• As always, we will monitor attendance but will no longer publish a dashboard. If you are interested in following COVID trends in the community, we encourage you to visit the county health website for local data. We will continue to monitor the health of our students and staff and communicate with families as we work to maintain and operate healthy learning environments.

• Students and staff who are sick or having symptoms should stay home and consider consulting with their healthcare provider on healthcare needs. Please be sure to report any absences to your child’s school.

• When you have symptoms, testing is key to reducing the spread in our school communities. We recommend that you take advantage of free at-home testing kits to keep on hand at home.

• We will continue to work with students, staff and families to address individual health and medical needs.

• Our goal is to maintain in-person learning for our students. We are pleased to continue to offer Virtual Campus, a full-time virtual learning experience, to meet the diverse needs of families and each individual learner. Providing choices for families is our goal.

Additional information for staff:

• Staff who are sick or having symptoms should stay home and consult with their physician on healthcare needs and when to return to work. Employees no longer need to complete a return to work form.

• If you have symptoms, testing is key to reducing the spread in our schools and workplace. We recommend that you take advantage of free at-home testing kits to keep on hand at home.

• Similar to any illness, an employee should call in to his/her supervisor as early as possible to report his/her absence. Per policy, in cases of absences of more than three (3) consecutive work days, the employee will be required to provide a physician’s statement indicating the reason for the absence and certifying that the employee is able to resume his/her regular duties. A physician’s statement may also be requested in cases of excessive or pattern absenteeism.

I continue to meet with our health services team and community medical advisors to determine the best ways to keep our students, staff and school communities healthy. Most importantly, we are excited and optimistic about the school year. In addition to our returning educators, we have a number of new teachers and administrators who have been working hard over the past few weeks and are ready and eager to greet your children. I personally look forward to welcoming all our students, staff and families back to a rewarding and successful year.

Dr. Keith Marty
Superintendent