COVID-19 cases among Hamilton County Schools students and staff have largely trended downward over the past month, continuing a pattern from mid-September, according to data collected on the district's COVID-19 data dashboard.
In the week leading to fall break from Oct. 11-15, active cases and active close contacts - individuals required to quarantine due to exposure to a positive case - among students dropped dramatically. There were 178 active cases and 995 active close contacts among the district's 44,000 students on Oct. 6, compared to 17 active cases and 374 active close contacts on Oct. 11.
Cases and close contacts began increasing from the plateau seen during the fall break but have not reached the same levels seen in September.
Among employees, cases and close contacts decreased steadily over the past month. On Oct. 6, there were 33 active COVID-19 cases and 15 active close contacts that dropped to 28 cases and 11 close contacts by Oct. 11.
Employee active close contacts have continued to decline, while employee active cases have hovered somewhere between 10 and 20 cases over the past two weeks.
Hamilton County Schools mandate masks for students to mitigate the spread of COVID-19, although parents can sign a form to opt their children out of the requirement.
Despite varying widely from school to school across the district, student mask opt-out rates have largely stayed the same at each school since August, according to data provided Thursday by Hamilton County Schools.
Barger Academy, Clifton Hills Elementary, East Lake Academy of Fine Arts, Hardy Elementary, Orchard Knob Middle, Tyner Middle Academy and Woodmore Elementary have maintained a student mask opt-out rate of 0% throughout the fall semester.
Sale Creek Middle/High School and Sequoyah High School maintain the highest student mask opt-out rates at nearly 58% and 53%, respectively.
A student at Sequoyah and a teacher at Sale Creek died of COVID-19 in September.
The Hamilton County Board of Education addressed masking for teachers and school staff at its October meeting, ultimately keeping the requirement in place in a 5-4 vote. A few board members cited lower case numbers among students and staff as reasoning to remove the requirement, while other board members and the interim superintendent, Nakia Towns, said removing the requirement would be premature.
Towns said one reason the district's leadership had not discussed making masks optional for employees was due to a low number of substitutes, who can cover only 50-60% of schools.
" we have an operational concern that when all the other respiratory illnesses show up, we don't have subs, y'all," she told the board. "We will need to shut down schools if" students start coming down with the flu.
The state legislature has also taken on the issue during its COVID-19 special session, with Republican lawmakers pushing to remove COVID-19 mandates, like proof of vaccination for workers, and blocking local school districts from imposing mask requirements.
Contact Anika Chaturvedi at achaturvedi@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6592.