Students and teacher wearing masks in classroom.Photo: Getty
A vice principal at a New Jersey elementary school has been suspended aftera COVID-19 outbreak at the schoolsickened eight staff members and one student.
The Lakewood Public Schools Board of Education agreed to a resolution to place the vice principal at Ella G. Clarke Elementary School on paid leave last Wednesday,NJ.com reported, while the district investigates how the virus spread through the school last month.
Eight staff memberscontracted COVID-19along with a student during the second week of February. Four of the staff members were teachers who had to be hospitalized with COVID-19 complications, Dawn Hiltner, a spokesperson for the teacher’s union, Lakewood Education Association, told NJ.com. They have since recovered and are back to work this week.
Hiltner said that they believe the outbreak began with one staffer who had dinner with another person on staff.
The district’s board of education agreed to place the vice president on paid leave until March 31, in part because they claim the vice president has not been willing to share information on whether the school was following the correct safety precautions for instruction during the pandemic, said Michael Inzelbuch, the board’s attorney and district spokesman.
The intention of the suspension is to “ascertain information and documentation that the superintendent has reported she has not received despite numerous requests, and that I haven’t received when I asked the employee’s attorney,” Inzelbuch told NJ.com.
PEOPLE has contacted the school district and the board of education for comment.
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Lakewood Public Schools is one of the few districts in New Jersey toprovide in-person classes for studentsthroughout this school year, a decision the union opposed. Hiltner said that the union wanted Clarke to close following the outbreak, but the school instead had the infected staffers and their close contacts quarantine at home.
More schools around the U.S. are moving to in-person learning as teachers get vaccinated and new research indicates that classrooms where students and staff are masked and socially distanced are at a low risk for COVID-19 spread. Last week, the Centers for Disease Control said thatschools can safely space children just 3 feet apartrather than 6, allowing for more students in the classroom.
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source: people.com
