GWINNETT COUNTY, Ga. — As the first day of classes approaches and with COVID-19 cases rising, one of the largest counties in metro Atlanta is preparing for students to come back to class.
Gwinnett County Public Schools informed 11Alive that it will enforce face masks for all staff while face coverings for students are strongly encouraged, clarifying they are not required to wear them.
All Gwinnett County employees are now required to wear face masks at county buildings and facilities, officials recently said in a news release.
This comes after the county reported their community level for COVID-19, which is determined by hospital bed usage, admissions and the number of new COVID-19 cases in the community — is high.
Dr. Al Taylor, GCPS Chief of Schools said the district is looking toward its upcoming year by looking back to last year.
"At this time last year, we saw one of the worst spikes that we've seen with the Delta variant that was raging. And there were a lot of lessons that I think we gathered and we put into place, you know, moving forward for this year," he said.
The school district will also implement a high cleaning regimen in all buses and classrooms and is encouraging anyone who feels sick to stay home.
A virtual learning option will also be available for students grades K-12 at Gwinnett County Public Schools for the upcoming academic year.
This is the first time a virtual program is available for students grades K-3.
"Now we're able to provide K-12 virtual instruction for parents who might not feel comfortable in the environment of increased case spread or who have just found that maybe their kids are more successful in a virtual platform," said Taylor.
Hybrid instruction will not be implemented according to Taylor, as the school district works toward maintaining in-person instruction.
"We've realized that there were a number of lessons learned through the pandemic. The necessity of in-person instruction was one of the biggest lessons that we learned," he said.
One of GCPS's goals is to have the staff necessary throughout the school year. Contact tracing and how that will look like for GCPS will be determined by their health response team.
Taylor added that GCPS's health response team works with county nurses and the Gwinnett County Department of Health.