This is the tale of an anonymous substitute teacher in an anonymous state in the year 2021. The pandemic of COVID-19 had been well underway for more than a year in the United States. Protocols had been implemented in all open school districts across the nation. In this anonymous area, school had been in session more than 7 months. Mask-wearing, at-home temperature screening, and sanitation of areas had been implemented with fidelity. The substitute whose story we've received permission to publish had been regularly subbing 2-4 days per week in the same edifice in which the story takes place. All names have been changed to protect the innocent... and the guilty.
The week started with zero positive cases in the school; it ended with 19... and then 29.
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On noon on Tuesday, March 23, 2021 an elementary teacher (hereafter referred to as Teacher A) and her 6th grade son (at a different school but in the same district) received confirmation that their prior test for COVID-19 had returned positive results. They had both been suffering from allergies and decided to be tested out of an abundance of caution earlier in the week. As they awaited their results, they each attended work/school. At noon, they each left to quarantine for the prescribed 10 days.
On Monday, March 29, Teacher A's substitute recorded 6 absences within the teacher's class. The teacher next door (hereafter referred to as Teacher B) recorded 7 absences. Each class had 26 children on the class roll. Teacher A and Teacher B are known as "switch teachers." They each teach the same content morning and afternoon, and their students attend class in one classroom in the morning and the other classroom in the afternoon. As per district guidelines, desks are wiped down with disinfectant during "switch time." Teacher A and Teacher B hold their classes in portable classrooms on-site at an elementary playground.
On Tuesday, March 30, Teacher A's substitute recorded 7 absences and Teacher B recorded 8 absences. Frustrated that more and more children were falling ill, Teacher B contacted district COVID-19 leadership with the absence information, as well as the number of positive COVID students within her classes. In response, Teacher B was told she was not to be in contact with parents of her students about their medical tests and their results.
At about 10am, school administration interrupted district-wide testing to abruptly move both classes of students into the school building. In order to enter the building, temperature forehead scans were used. Teacher A's class had 3 students sent home - one complained of stomach pain, one had a fever of 103 and one had a gaiter. (According to district protocols, gaiters, though officially permitted, require immediate quarantine if exposure is confirmed.)
Upon occupying an classroom being used as storage within the school building, the substitute tried to resume district content testing. A district nurse was called upon to administer oral temperature checks and to ask a series for symptom questions of students, who were each called into the hall for this private screening. Twelve more students had their belongings collected for them as they were escorted to the office.
That night Teacher B and Teacher B's daughter - a student at the same school - tested positive for COVID-19 after more than a week of allergy-like symptoms. Our anonymous substitute was notified via text message of the diagnoses.
On Wednesday, March 31st, the substitute arrived at the school to discover that no absence had been recorded for Teacher B. She volunteered to cover both Teacher A and Teacher B's classes, since each class was likely to be small. At 10am, when attendance was officially recorded for the day, 16 children of the 52 on the class rolls were in attendance. Teacher B's classroom was left locked and dark, and the substitute taught from Teacher A's classroom.
After consulting the art teacher if it would be okay to combine the classes for this day and being denied, the anonymous substitute led two lines of students inside the building to attend their Specials class - 8 to Computers and 8 to Art. The Computers teacher was not consulted as she was a substitute this day as well.
At 9:30am, the principal visited the classroom to notify the substitute and her students that parents were being notified to obtain permission to COVID test on-site during the school day. The principal instructed the substitute to keep the classroom door locked and indicated that she alone could open the door to knocks. No visitors (for example, inclusion special education instructors) were to be permitted inside the classroom. The children were panicked and wished to call their parents. Concerned for possible administrative consequences, the substitute denied their anguished requests.
District nurses and other staff setup in Teacher B's classroom next door throughout the rest of the morning. Other teachers, staff and students throughout the building began to receive optional COVID testing, but the students in the substitute's classroom were not pulled to test nor informed if their parents had consented or not.
At noon, the substitute asked the lead secretary when her students would receive their testing. With lunch looming at 1:15, she wanted them to be able to leave their claustrophobic confines to eat and play, as healthy children should. She was scoffed at for her naivety and informed the students would remain within the locked classroom for the remainder of the day, except for emergency restroom needs.
COVID testing of the class finally began about 12:30pm. Through tears and fear, each child sought comfort from the substitute, who provided calming words and side-ways hugs. As the first student (hereafter referred to as Student 1) was called out and quickly returned to her work, the nervous anticipation subsided slightly.
Suddenly, the masked nurse entered the room and quickly and wordlessly escorted Student 1 back next door grabbing her backpack off her chair and cramming her desktop items into it. Nothing was said, but all knew what her results must be.
A second and then third student were then pulled for their tests, but now each student remained next door while each awaited their results. As the door opened between the rooms, the nurse would either call another student's name to test or instruct the substitute to pack up the previous student's things.
By 2pm, 6 students had been silently removed from class and never returned. The substitute spent the time spraying disinfectant and wiping down desks, chairs, plexiglass and Chromebooks. Hand sanitizer was also liberally applied.
Frustrated at the lack of information and apparent disregard for her own health, the substitute asked why so many teachers throughout the building had been permitted to receive a COVID test. The nurse replied, "Oh, do you want one too?"
At 1:30pm, with 10 negative students remaining, the office called to tell the substitute that a student was being checked out for the day and to bring her things to the office. Then the conversation went like this...
Secretary: "Do you know what's going on?"
Substitute: "No, no one has told me anything."
Secretary: "They are all going home. Parents have been notified that the classroom is shut down, and all students must be picked up immediately."
Substitute: "The negative students are going home early too?"
Secretary: "Yes, all students are now immediately quarantined."
For the next 30 minutes, the phone rang frantically for student pickups, and the substitute was pulled next door for her COVID test. She was permitted to return to the classroom while awaiting her results, to clean more and answer the persistent phone. After 15 minutes, she asked and was told her results were negative. She then asked the nurse, "Since I'm half vaccinated (she had received her first COVID dose 2 weeks previously), I don't need to quarantine, right?" To which she was told that she was also quarantined and was not permitted to work for the coming 10 days.
At 2:15, two students remained. A call to the office informed the substitute that these two parents were angry that their children were being sent home, since they had permitted the testing and had tested negative, but by 2:30, all students were gone.
The anonymous substitute called Teacher A and informed her about the day and her students' status. She had not been told her students had been tested at school, nor had she been told that all students had been sent home, regardless of their COVID status. She was furious at the lack of transparency.
The substitute went to the office to check out for the day and wait for her own biological children to be dismissed. She informed the secretary of her upcoming substitute assignments and her now-quarantined status. The secretary quietly removed her upcoming assignments from the system.
Wednesday evening the District sent an email to all elementary parents informing them that there were 19 active COVID cases isolated to one portable classroom unit, and that all blame should be placed on inconsistently teacher-implemented COVID safety protocols. The next days - Thursday and Friday - were scheduled school closures for the Easter weekend holiday. That Sunday evening the district emailed an updated active COVID case count of 29, and parents within the other portable classroom unit were also told their classrooms were closed for the coming week, effectively quarantining the entire grade-level, who would be receiving e-learning instruction from their quarantined teachers.
The anonymous substitute spent the week volunteering at an unaccompanied children's refugee center in her hometown, where she was COVID tested daily before working with the children. She was negative each time.
