FORT WORTH, Texas — Around 100,000 students from Irving and Arlington ISDs will become the latest to go back to school in-person when they return Monday.
Steven Poole represents 44 districts as the executive director of the United Educators Association. He says preventing outbreaks so far has come down to how closely districts follow their plans.
“There’s still a lot of anxiety and fear among educators as they’re going back,” Poole said. “These districts have been developing their own plans but they’re only as good as the paper than they’re written on if you don’t execute those plans.”
Teachers in Fort Worth ISD and some students in Dallas ISD will also head back to classrooms Monday.
“The districts that are encouraging students to wear masks are faring a lot better because social distancing may not be possible in classrooms, but mask-wearing is going to be very important,” Poole said.
Dallas County Health Director Dr. Phil Huang says there’s wasn’t a large Labor Day spike like Memorial Day, but they’ve started to see clusters of cases in youth sports teams.
“Everyone is very concerned about the next couple weeks,” Huang said.
Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins tweeted Sunday 225 school-aged children in the county tested positive for the virus in the weeks that ended September 19.
“If we start to see increased cases and clusters in some of those settings, that would be concerning and again, we’re working with the schools as we speak,” Huang said.
Check Dallas ISD's coronavirus dashboard here.
According to state health officials, 3,720 students and 3,053 staff at schools have tested positive for COVID-19 since classes began again this fall. But Poole says those numbers are low compared to what could happen if outbreaks start to snowball.
“We can’t be too comfortable in the middle of a pandemic,” he said. “We’re going to have to work the guideline over and over and make sure that everything is followed.”
Huang says numbers in the county are now either flat or trending up.
“People are getting tired of doing all the distancing and washing your hands and wearing the masks, but that’s what’s going to drive all this,” he said.
He’s working with school districts but says it’s up to everyone to keep schools and businesses from closing again.
“Everyone just needs to be really vigilant on it and not let up,” he said.