After three positive COVID-19 tests at Lakeview Elementary caused officials to close the building down this week, Colonial Heights Public Schools (CHPS) announced on Friday that they intend to have students returning for in-person learning on November 9th.
In an interview on Thursday with Petersburg Scope, CHPS Superintendent William Sroufe said that they have not had any additional positive cases at Lakeview beyond the three cases they announced earlier in the week.
According to Sroufe, the first two positive cases were located in different learning zones within the school. Additionally, after contact tracing, they realized that some individuals were moving from zone-to-zone, which led to them closing the building on Sunday.
While noting that they are still waiting to get all of the test results back, Sroufe said it appears that the source of the positive cases came from outside of the building.
Lakeview teachers were allowed to enter the building on Monday morning to get their equipment and teaching supplies – they were also given Tuesday to plan and prepare before they began teaching their classes virtually on Wednesday.
Sroufe said on Thursday that the transition process has gone really well.
Colonial Heights, which is a small district consisting of only five public schools, has been offering in-person learning to their students since the first day of school in September. This was the first instance during the current school year where a CHPS school building was shut down due to COVID-19. If the students return to Lakeview on the 9th, they will only miss two weeks of in-person learning.
As an aside, school officials said that the school will be deep-cleaned prior to election day, making it available for voters.
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