A high school in Gordon County, Georgia, has been temporarily closed as 14 teachers and 47 students have been quarantined under COVID-19 public health guidelines.
As of Wednesday afternoon, one student and four teachers had tested positive for the coronavirus at Gordon Central High School. Superintendent Kimberly Fraker said the district has been prepared for a situation like this and the closing of Gordon Central is an early example of its plan in practice.
Gordon Central High closed Wednesday and all students were to transition to a virtual learning program beginning Aug. 24. The school plans on reopening for face-to-face instruction Sept. 2.
Fraker said the student who tested positive attended the first day of school. On Friday, the district announced one teacher had tested positive and the other three had tested positive between Saturday and Tuesday.
Principal Brian Hall said in a statement sent to parents and staff that only one student has tested positive for COVID-19 but after contact tracing the one case, the school will not have enough teachers in the building because so many are having to quarantine.
Fraker said because 14 teachers are in precautionary quarantine - combined with the four positive cases and other teachers out for various reasons - it was decided the school would close for at least two weeks and transition to online learning.
Georgia - unlike Tennessee - does not consider teachers and educators as "critical infrastructure," meaning teachers in Georgia still have to quarantine for 14 days if they have been exposed to someone with COVID-19. Because of that, Fraker said Gordon Central couldn't keep enough adults in the building to justify having kids attend classes at school.
Fraker said that some of the news coverage around the state - particularly in the Atlanta area - has portrayed schools as failures when they have suspended face-to-face instruction. She said she doesn't feel like that's the case.
"This is what we planned for," she said. "We knew this was a possibility and our plan is working. We've been proactive about this and are doing the things we promised our community we would do. We'll monitor our schools each day and if we have to close a school for a period of time, we'll do that so that we don't interrupt every other school."
Fraker said the closing will not affect extracurricular activities.
"Teachers will return to the building to reinvent the way we instruct virtually," Hall said. "This will not be like it was back in March; teachers will be able to record videos, meet with students via video apps and the experience will be much more interactive."
COVID-19 cases have been slowly falling since the beginning of August in Gordon County. The county did register a daily record of 66 cases on Aug. 8, but the seven-day moving average of cases has been falling since July 31 - when the daily average was 31 new cases - to an average of 12 new cases on Wednesday.
Contact Patrick Filbin at pfilbin@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6476. Follow him on Twitter @PatrickFilbin.