COVID-19 Testing Updates

COVID-19 Testing Updates

Dear North Reading Public Schools Community,

As an update to our exploration of the Binax NOW antigen test and the Pooled Testing options I wanted to share the following information. We will be hosting a forum for staff on February 2^nd at 7:15 a.m. and one for families at 7 p.m. and the sessions will be recorded. A brief survey will be shared after these presentations in order to gauge interest and information about our participation in the pooled testing.

Symptomatic Testing (Binax NOW)

Our nurses have completed their training and we are in the process of sending out the consent forms to all staff and families in the coming days via email. This process will involve creating an account for Project Beacon (you may already have such an account if you’ve registered for a test at a local site.) This will allow you to provide consent for yourself or for students in our system so that we may begin to administer to test to those with symptoms.

A few key points:

--Staff and students must continue to stay home when sick. The availability of symptomatic testing should not, in any way, increase the numbers of individuals coming to school who are not feeling well.

--This test is for symptomatic individuals only.

--Anyone who receives a positive results will be treated as a positive test (98.6% specificity)    

     and contract tracing will commence immediately.

--Anyone who tests negative must quarantine and take a PCR test within a specific number of

    days.

--Anyone who does not wish to give consent simply does not complete the forms. If the staff or student comes to the nurse with symptoms he or she will be sent home for quarantine and testing following the same process that has been in place since the beginning of the year.

--Emails with information about providing consent through the Project Beacon account will be sent in the coming days

Pooled Testing

The district continues to explore pooled testing opportunities and the return on our investment for participation. There are six weeks of testing materials that are provided for free from the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education but there are additional costs and considerations for our resources (time for testing, time for nurses to administer, time to transport materials, logistics to develop the pools, additional costs, etc.)

If we are to participate the 6 weeks are clearly defined as beginning on February 8^th-12^th and ending on March 26^th. The week of February 15^th (February Recess) does not count as one of the six weeks and there would be no testing that week.

There will be a lot to do to get everything in place for February 8^th and we are considering (if we do end up participating) whether to begin at one school/campus and then expand to others after the break.

We will send out the links for Tuesday’s forum with a follow up email next week.

Thank you for your patience and support as we explore these initiatives for our community.

Be well,

 Dr. Daly