Keeping ill children home helps keep everyone safe and healthy

Dear Fort Plain Parents and Guardians,

I’d like to thank you for your ongoing support of our efforts to provide a positive environment for all of our children to learn and grow. In view of the incidence of positive COVID-19 cases in surrounding regions, this is a friendly reminder that in order for us to keep everyone safe and healthy, we request your continued due diligence in keeping your children home if they are sick.

The New York State Department of Health has created a Pre-K-12 COVID-19 Toolkit to assist parents and guardians in making decisions when their children are ill. Especially helpful are the toolkit flowcharts for “Can my child go to school today?” and “My child has COVID19 symptoms. When can they go back to school?” These step-by-step guides will walk you through the decision-making process. Images of these guides appear at the end of this letter. In addition to these guides, the full toolkit offers other resources.

I would also like to remind you of our district’s protocol should a positive COVID-19 case be confirmed. In the event of a positive COVID-19 case connected to the Fort Plain Schools community, we will work with the county health department and will issue a notification to families as guided by the health department.

Please note that while notification of a positive case will indicate the school the individual is connected to, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and other privacy laws restrict the district from disclosing or confirming any personally identifiable information, and we cannot identify anyone who has tested positive.

The county health department will reach out to all contacts of the individual confirmed to have COVID-19 and advise on the need for quarantine and testing of those exposed.

I’d also like to note that to keep the Fort Plain community informed, we regularly post important updates and resources related to COVID-19 on our district website’s School Reopening/COVID-19 Updates webpage.

In closing, I’d like to say that as always, we trust our parents and guardians will continue to use your best judgment when making decisions about keeping children home from school. I appreciate your understanding and thank you again for your cooperation. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact me.

Sincerely,
John Bishop
Superintendent of Schools