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The Westhampton Beach High School. file photo
Westhampton Beach parent Tabitha Spizuoco said the school district has a communications problem that needs fixing.
The mother of three said she knew of six positive COVID-19 cases from parents of 11th graders in school with her son by the morning after Thanksgiving — on Friday, November 27 — but she and others say the school has yet to get the number of cases right, and they feel more students should be warned of potential infection.
“I was concerned this week when I heard so many high school students had tested positive for COVID-19 and we were not hearing anything from the school,” Ms. Spizuoco said. “I expected to receive announcements from the school notifying us about the cases and I expected a call about needing to quarantine. When neither of those things happened, I became apprehensive that the system I thought the school had in place was not working.”
She said days passed before she heard anything about positive cases from the school.
“It wasn’t until other parents started reaching out to the superintendent’s office asking what was going on that we received a notice about two cases, even though there were more than two,” Ms. Spizuoco said. “But the notice was vague. It gave no information about when the students had been in school and it said nothing about quarantine of any other students or teachers.”
Superintendent Michael Radday confirmed the two cases in an evening email to parents on Sunday, November 29.
“We continue to follow guidance from the Suffolk County Department of Health to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 in our schools,” he said in the email. “Data has shown that schools are not a major source of community spread because of the health and safety measures that are in place. We will continue to monitor the situation closely.”
Mr. Radday then sent out a letter to residents Sunday evening saying the district was aware of three positive cases.
“The individuals who tested positive for COVID-19 have been isolated and will not be permitted to return to school for at least 10 days and with appropriate medical clearance,” he wrote. “Based on the timeline of when the students tested positive and when they were last in school, there are no close contacts in school who need to be quarantined as a result of these positive cases.”
Still anxious about sending her children to school, Ms. Spizuoco said she called and spoke with Mr. Radday on Monday morning to clarify if the school’s policy had changed. In fact, she said, it did.
“Mr. Radday confirmed that guidance on quarantining changed in the beginning of November — only ‘close contacts’ now need to be quarantined, within 6 feet for more than 10 minutes. So, technically, since desks are 6 feet apart, classroom contact would no longer be quarantined,” the parent said. “I pointed out to him that does not necessarily mean kids are not in close contact just because their desks are 6 feet apart, and for this reason I felt they should still notify parents if someone in their child’s class tested positive so the parents could make the decision whether their child needed to be tested, regardless of whether they were going to be quarantined.”
Ms. Spizuoco said the superintendent agreed it wouldn’t be a bad idea. She said, though, that she got the impression that was not going to happen.
“I still strongly feel that parents should be notified when someone in their child’s class tests positive so that they can get their kids tested,” Ms. Spizuoco said. “I also told him that not informing the school community that this policy had changed created a lot of upset and unnecessary ill feelings toward administration among parents in the past week — people were concerned and had no idea the policy had changed; something should have gone out to parents. Again, he agreed that it probably should have, but had no explanation for why it didn’t.”
Later on Monday, a second letter went out to parents that the district received four additional notifications that one middle school and three high school students had tested positive for COVID-19.
“The tests were all from last week and positive results reported to the district today,” Mr. Radday said on Monday. “There was a lag in these cases being reported to the district.”
This worried Dr. Alexis Gersten, a parent who emailed the school nurse about the circumstances surrounding the cases. She did not receive a response.
“Unlike the previous letters provided to parents, this letter gave no indication when these students were last in school or when they were tested. The letter did state that ‘based on the timeline’ no one else needed to quarantine. What timeline is the district using? Are they using a new timeline?” she asked. “Why did the district decide to leave this information out of this letter to parents? Is this a new policy?”
On Tuesday, she said she was still confused by the two emails she received.
“Something is fishy,” parent Mary Alyce Rogers said. “Moms have been informing each other of kids testing positive in the same friend groups. Some of these students were in school on Monday and Tuesday and their friends are getting tested as they sit right near them in class.”
In the letter that went out Monday, Mr. Radday said students who were “deemed close contacts of the positive individuals have been contacted directly and will be quarantined for 14 days.”
“The Suffolk County Department of Health defines close contacts as those persons who were within 6 feet of the positive case for 10 minutes or more during the infectious period. The infectious period is 48 hours prior to symptom onset or 48 hours prior to the test date if the positive case is asymptomatic,” Mr. Radday said in the letter. “The health and safety of our students and staff is our foremost priority. The next few weeks will be critical as we try to keep COVID-19 from spreading in our schools.”
