There has been lots of progress made in schools from the height of the pandemic in December, and lots more to come with vaccinations and warmer weather.
As shown by data from the ADH, the Rector and Marked Tree districts are currently leading Arkansas’ school districts for the highest percent of people who have gotten COVID in the state, at 16.25% and 15.27% respectively. In addition to this, the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville has the highest number of active cases out of all of Arkansas’ colleges and college campuses. However, Fayetteville Public Schools has one of the lowest percentages of people who have gotten COVID in the state, at only 0.84%.
Alan Wilbourn, the Public Information Officer at Fayetteville Public Schools, spoke on the measures the schools have taken and how effective they have been. The first measures the schools implemented had actually been in place before COVID, as best practices for flu season. One example of this is how they already had backpack disinfectant units ready. The schools had also already been transitioning to a system where each student has their own laptop they are able to bring home with them. This meant that virtual learning was much easier to put in place. While not everyone has suitable internet, it was still a significantly smoother switch because of that.
They have had a mask mandate in place all of this school year, requiring students and staff to wear masks at all times except when eating lunch. According to Wilbourn, even the elementary schools have done a good job of wearing masks. He says that making a routine out of it helped: “This would be where you wear your mask, you wash your hands, and go get some hand sanitizer. And [the elementary school students] really bought into that”.
In the future, Wilbourn says there may be masks in the fall, and that the schools will evaluate performance over the rest of the year to make that call. He also says that “I think… something we can count on for the next few years is that in addition to getting your flu shot every year, you’ll get your COVID shot every year”.
Springdale is another school district that has been doing well. Their Director of Communications, Trent Jones, spoke on this. Similarly to Fayetteville schools, they require that in most situations masks be worn when indoors. However, they say on their website that “staff and presenters may remove face coverings while teaching if 12 feet distancing is maintained”.
Springdale has been doing tests on-location at their schools and has also run three vaccination clinics for staff (they happened before minors were eligible to receive the vaccine). According to Jones, while they don’t have plans for conducting more vaccine drives, what they’re doing is “providing information for… our 16 year olds and older and any faculty or staff that might not have been vaccinated yet”.