Elmont, Sewanhaka schools closed for Covid cases

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Elmont and Sewanhaka school district officials have had to close some school buildings last week, as the novel coronavirus continues to spread through the community.

H. Frank Carey High School, for example, was closed for in-person instruction on Oct. 22 and 23, after a student tested positive for Covid-19. The two-day closure, Sewanhaka Superintendent James Grossane explained, enabled district officials to clean and disinfect the building, and provided Nassau County Department of Health officials with time to conduct contact tracing and notify anyone who had been in contact with the infected individual, as the entire student body learns remotely.

It was able to reopen for in-person learning on Oct. 26.

“As always,” Grossane said, “the health and safety of our students, faculty and staff are our top priority.”

In the Elmont elementary school district, meanwhile, several Dutch Broadway classes had to switch to remote learning while the students were quarantined last week.

In two different cases, the district was notified by the Nassau County Department of Health that a parent of students at the school had tested positive for the virus. No student or staff member tested positive for it in either case, Superintendent Kenneth Rosner wrote in his letters to parents on Oct. 20 and Oct. 22, but the affected families were told to remain at home and the classes the students are in were quarantined for 14 days, while the building was thoroughly cleaned and disinfected.

The district’s transportation services were also canceled on Oct. 21 because a staff member at the Elmont Road School — where the transportation department is located — had the virus. Again, he said, no student had tested positive for the virus, and the district would continue to work with the Nassau County Department of Health and “take all necessary precautions to ensure the health and safety of our school community.”

“I am confident our approach to addressing the safety of students during the pandemic will continue to serve the entire community well,” Rosner said.