COVID-19 spreading quickly in Medicine Hat schools

While the public school division implemented similar pandemic measures as last year, there is a major difference.

“We don’t have anywhere near as clear of data because Alberta Health Services isn’t doing track, trace, isolate and they don’t tell us who’s tested positive or if there’s a close contact,” Davidson said.

Prairie Rose School Division is dealing with 22 active cases of COVID-19 at Eagle Butte High School. IF Cox, Parkside and Irvine also have cases.

Prairie Rose Supt. Roger Clarke says there’s an expectation kids will be safe at school. But when students step off the bus, there are no government-ordered parameters in place.

“All those different parameters and things we would think about depending upon the age of the children, how many cases,” Clarke said. “And sort of being a little like health, trying to figure out when symptoms began.”

Tracing and tracking is something Davidson wishes was still in place.

“I miss the level of service and supports in collaboration we had with AHS,” Davidson said.

It’s not only students who are impacted by the rising cases, major staff shortages could become an issue.

“We have a number of staff who are forced to isolate because they’ve tested positive, vaccinated or not, and now they are sick,” Davidson said. “Now they’re not able to provide support for instruction while they are home which means we are going to have to rely heavily on our substitutes teachers this year.”

In the Catholic school division, four schools have positive cases, including 19 students and one staff member.

Supt. Dwayne Zarichny says the cases haven’t proved to be a significant issue in disrupting classrooms.

“Our staff are fully engaged with Google Classroom and having that experience from last year. So students that are staying at home to quarantine have access to a regular education like they did last year,” Zarichny said.

As for the provincial back-to-school plan, Zarichny believes it’s been an effective one.

“The plan this year that the province had was given out well in advance and jurisdictions had time to digest it and make sense of it,” Zarichny said. “Really work through it in their context.”

According to Alberta’s 2021–2022 School Year Plan, if cases resurge enough to impact the province’s education system, students will go back to online learning from home.

by Teagan Rasche

COVID-19 spreading quickly in Medicine Hat schools

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