County school system monitoring spread of Flu across state
Published 8:46 am Tuesday, February 14, 2017
While more than 20 counties across East and Middle Tennessee have closed over recent weeks due to illness, Carter County schools have not seen a significant increase in student absences recently according to the system’s top official.
“We’re running about 92 percent attendance on average right now,” said Director of Carter County Schools Dr. Kevin Ward on Monday.
While there has not been a spike in absences among students and staff, Ward said he and other school system supervisors are continuing to monitor the situation.
Over the past three weeks, several school systems across the state have closed due to illness for short periods, many attributing the increased absences to the spread of Flu and Norovirus among students and staff. Most of the closures have been in Middle Tennessee and the Knoxville area, but the trend has been moving eastward. Both Hawkins County and Sullivan County closed their schools Monday and Tuesday of this week in response to illness outbreaks.
“In some of these other systems their attendance numbers haven’t been that low, it’s been they’ve had so much sickness within their faculty and not able to get substitutes,” Ward said, adding he has been in touch with many other school system administrators across the region. “Right now, we don’t seem to be pretty hard hit. It may be creeping this way, though.”
Ward said he and other system officials in Carter County are monitoring attendance daily, both among students and faculty, to keep an eye out for any issues that may arise.
“It’s not bad enough at this time to make a system-wide decision,” Ward said.
Among those working to keep Ward informed is Beth Bare, Director of Coordinated School Health for the Carter County School System. Bare has been in contact with principals and school nurses at each of the county’s school to stay up-to-date on the situation.
“Right now we are fairly average as far as absences for students and a little low for staff absences,” Bare said. “Right now we are just asking our principals and nurses to monitor absences, both students and staff and for our nurses to report any confirmed cases of Flu.”
Bare said the school system is asking for school employees and janitors to do some extra cleaning, especially on common surfaces such as doorknobs, desks and water fountains to combat the spread of germs.
“People that are sick, we are asking them to stay home,” Bare said.