Colfax school board retains masks optional policy
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By LeAnn R. Ralph
COLFAX — The Colfax Board of Education has agreed to keep the “masks optional” policy in the Back-to-School Plan for dealing with COVID-19 — at least for now.
In the first month of school, has the masks optional policy worked? asked Ken Neuburg, school board member, at the Board of Education’s September 20 meeting.
The Colfax school board approved making masks optional in school district buildings during the June meeting.
Masks were required for everyone in the buildings during the previous school year.
About 20 people attended the school board meeting, which was held in the high school gymnasium.
Last year when school started, it was unknown whether requiring everyone to wear masks would help to keep school open, said William C. Yingst Jr., district administrator.
As it turned out, last year was very successful because the Colfax school district remained open all year without any shut-downs because of a spike in COVID-19 cases, he said.
This year “is not close,” Yingst said, adding that in his opinion, the policy “is not successful so far.”
“Hope is not a plan,” he said.
The Colfax school district has 750 students and 100 staff members, so there are “lots of people in close proximity,” Yingst said.
So far this year, in the first 13 days of school, there are more cases of COVID-19 than there were for all of last year, he said.
As of the day of the school board meeting, there were 46 positive cases of the coronavirus in the district. On September 9, there were 93 people quarantined. On September 16, there were 87 people quarantined, and on September 20, there were 73 people quarantined, Yingst said.
The Colfax High School football team has missed two games because of COVID illnesses and exposures, and there is not much of a likelihood that they will be able to make up those games, which has a special impact on the football players who are seniors, he said.
Goal
The goal is to keep school open for in-person learning, Yingst said.
The question is — how do we keep school open? he asked.
At all of the meetings he has attended, the information has remained consistent that COVID is a respiratory illness spread through airborne respiratory droplets and is not spread very much on surfaces, Yingst said.
According to health experts, the Delta variant, which is the most dominant strain of COVID-19 circulating now, is much more contagious than the original COVID-19.
Another question is — what can close down the Colfax school system? Yingst asked.
The answer is — more COVID cases, he said.
As is true of other school districts, Colfax is experiencing a lack of substitutes.
The lack of substitutes is not only substitute teachers, but also substitute cooks, office staff and bus drivers, Yingst said.
If teachers are out of school because they are sick with COVID-19 or because they have been exposed to the coronavirus, then there will not be enough substitute teachers to teach the classes, he said.
Last week, John Dachel, Colfax middle school and high school principal, ended up “subbing” because there was a lack of substitute teachers, Yingst said.
If the bus drivers are ill or quarantined, and there are no substitute bus drivers, then there is no way to transport students to school, he said.
If food service staff members are sick or quarantined, and there are no substitute cooks, then there is no way to make meals to feed the students, Yingst said.
“One case (of COVID) in any area could wipe out the entire area,” he said.
“These are facts. They are not an opinion and not anecdotal,” Yingst said.
Influenza season also is starting, and there is the same expectation for influenza as there is for COVID — if students are exhibiting symptoms, keep them home. Staying home when sick is the best way to not spread an illness, he said
Surveys
Surveys of staff and students show they are split about 50-50 on whether masks should be optional or required, Yingst said.
Over 50 percent of the staff are concerned about COVID-19, and about 20 percent are concerned because they are immunocompromised or have a family member who is immunocompromised, he said.
All together, about 100 students and staff in the Colfax school district are immunocompromised, and if they get a serious illness, it can put their health and their life in danger, Yingst said.
The whole situation is much more challenging this year. The school district nurse and the nurse’s aide spend countless hours contacting parents about COVID — and they spend countless hours getting yelled at, he said.
“I’ve come to the conclusion we really can’t win,” he said, noting that the 50-50 split about wearing masks is everywhere — the school, the village, the county, the state and the country as a whole.
The number one priority is to keep everyone safe, he said, adding that he was hired to run a school and that people would not compromise safety in other areas.
“We are doing the best we can to keep the school open,” Yingst said.
“It is time to put a call out for decency … people are just going to have to agree to disagree,” he said.
“Everybody can’t have their own way,” Yingst said.
The school district has been dealing with the ÇOVID-19 pandemic for a year and a half, and Yingst said he was “not here to be adversarial.”
Jodi Kiekhafer, school board member, said the school district should go back to requiring everyone to wear masks.
“We want to keep everyone here … we want the kids to be here,” she said.
Increase or decrease
Kyle Knutson, school board member, asked if the number of COVID cases was increasing.
The number is increasing, and after the weekends, there are more cases, Yingst said.
On August 2, the Dunn County Health Department reported 32 new cases of COVID-19 in the previous seven days. Since then, COVID-19 cases have been increasing in the county. On September 21, the health department reported 126 new cases in the last seven days.
“We control what we can control,” Yingst said.
The students are only in school for six or seven hours a day, he said.
Are there more cases in the general population of students or in certain groups? asked Ken Bjork, school board member.
So far, there does not appear to have been much spread of the coronavirus in school, but COVID-19 is going through families, Yingst said.
The high school has had 33 positive cases so far this year, and there have been five cases in the middle school and eight cases among elementary school children, he said.
What percentage of students are wearing masks? Knutson asked.
Dachel, Trevor Hovde, elementary principal, and Polly Rudi, director of pupil services, said that between 10 and 20 percent of the students are wearing masks in school.
Flexibility
Whatever the school board decides to do, the review of the Back-to-School plan is a month by month review, Neuburg said, noting that maintaining flexibility is a good strategy along with assessing whether the situation is better or worse or improving or not improving.
Knutson said he wanted “to go another month and see what happens.”
The elementary and middle school have fewer cases while the high school has the bulk of the cases, Bjork said.
After school, the high school students are interacting more at their jobs and when they play sports, he said, adding, “it’s a fluid situation.”
Bjork also suggested waiting another month to see what happens.
If the cases spike or the situation gets much worse, the school board can always have a special meeting, he said.
Knutson made a motion to keep the Back-to-School plan as is with masks optional.
Jaclyn Ackerlund, school board member, seconded the motion.
Voting in favor of the motion were Todd Kragness, school board president, and Knutson, Bjork, Ackerlund, Neuburg and Andrew De Moe.
Kiekhafer voted against the motion.
Spectators
The Colfax school board also agreed to allow spectators at sports events to continue with no restrictions and to review the situation for winter sports.
Fall sports are both indoor and outdoor activities, but there is more indoor spread of COVID-19, Yingst said, noting that volleyball is the only fall sport that is played inside.
There is enough room outside that people can spread out for football games, he said.
There have been no recommendations from the health department to limit spectators now, although maybe there will be for winter sports, Yingst said.
Other business
In other business, the Colfax Board of Education:
• Approved the energy efficiency exemption of $179,569 with $17,428 in utility savings in the 2020-2021 school year.
• Accepted a donation of $2,000 from Colfax Chevrolet for the student assistance fund.
• Learned that Colfax High School is offering up to 43 credits for students to earn at the college level through the Early College Credit program for universities and the Start College Now program for technical schools. The classes offered are medical terminology, horticulture, psychology (distance learning), accounting, Microsoft Office Suite, marketing, sociology (distance learning), Sign Language I and Sign Language II (distance learning), publications, statistics, CAD and solid modeling, fundamentals of speech (distance learning), economics (distance learning), fundamentals of engineering, AP Biology, AP Psychology, AP Calculus and AP Literature.
• Learned that there are 343 students in kindergarten through sixth grade signed up for the Accelerated Reader program.
Following a closed session, the Board of Education:
• Approved hiring Nichelle Wollberg as the National Honor Society advisor.
• Approved hiring Brittany Halvorson-Canfield as the high school student council co-advisor.
• Approved hiring Emily Miller as the high school student council co-advisor.