Physical Health for District Leaders

Collaborate with your local public health department to track COVID-19 vaccination data that may inform school operating status and on-going mitigation planning and decision-making. For example:
- Efficacy—prevention of disease, prevention of severe disease, prevention of spread—of the vaccines administered.
- Mutations and the changing genome of the virus over time.
- Percentage of persons in the community vaccinated.
- Percentage of district and school employees vaccinated.
- Percentage of students vaccinated.
- Rate at which vaccinations are administered in the community.
Based on state guidance, where possible, consider partnering with your local public health department to provide school-based sites for COVID-19 vaccine administration for the community.
Collaborate with your local public health department to understand if, and at what point, core mitigation measures (masking, social distancing, hand, hygiene and respiratory etiquette, cleaning and disinfection, and contact tracing) may change as a result of COVID-19 vaccination.
Collaborate with your local public health department to understand if, and at what point, CDC-designated metrics of community burden (e.g., the number of new cases per 100,000 persons within the last 14 days, and/or the percentage of RT-PRC tests that are positive during the last 14 days) may change as a result of COVID-19 vaccination.
Maintain up-to-date student and employee COVID-19 case tracking systems to detect case outbreaks, share best practices with other schools in the district, and improve data sharing with local health departments.
Continually reassess, in consultation with your local public health department, what the best quarantine protocol is (community spread and vaccination rates will influence this decision).
Work with your local public health department and utilize CDC cost estimation tools to build PPE budgets for full in-person and hybrid operating scenarios over the next 12-18 months.
Work with your local public health department to make broadly available clear outcome reviews of the clinical COVID-19 vaccine trials for adults and in children, including to what extent it has been tested in children, what the side effects are, how the vaccine will be delivered—injection, inhaled, or orally—and what the financial burden will be for parents.
Build budgets that optimize for accessible healthcare, including full-time or shared nurses, at schools.
Implement a COVID-19 surveillance testing protocol for all schools (this may be necessary through the fall depending on the level of community spread and vaccination percentages).
Collaborate with your local public health department to continue educating the public of the non-pharmacologic mitigation efforts necessary to limit the spread of COVID-19 until sufficient herd immunity is attained.
Establish a drinking water quality maintenance plan to reduce detrimental health risks associated with low to no use of water due to school closures.
Continue to share information with the community quickly and transparently including positive cases, quarantines, and outbreaks in line with previously established communication measures.
Consider collaborating with local public health departments to educate the community about necessary efforts to return to in-person instruction, with focus on a culturally competent COVID-19 vaccination rollout.
Ensure air filtration systems meet established guidance from the CDC, state, and local public health departments.