As the COVID situation heats up a little bit here in the district, I thought it was a good time to reach out with some up to date information.  First of all, I want to thank our employees, parents, and students for all you have done in helping us to execute our COVID plan at Tri-Valley. I was hopeful when we started in August that we would be able to get in at least three weeks of school before things began to shut back down. Here we are approaching the end of the first nine weeks and our plan has worked even better than most of us anticipated.

That being said, last week brought with it the largest number of new positive COVID cases for employees and students that we have faced yet. The school district has been working very closely with the Muskingum County Health Department, our impacted families, and our staff as we work through each case individually. We continue to learn and adjust based upon these experiences.

We have no intention of shutting down school at this time. The number of cases would have to be much higher than what we are seeing currently for us to consider such measures again. That being said, our remote learning plan should allow for us to continue having school even if we do reach those types of numbers. Remote learning is by no means perfect, but it has allowed us to continue to move the school year forward and our staff members have stepped up to make our plan even more successful than many anticipated.

We have had numerous employees tested for COVID -19 thus far, and only one positive case. We have had 7 students (as of today) that have tested positive (3 have already recovered and returned to school). We have even more students quarantined because other family members have tested positive. If community members have questions about the quarantine, remote learning, or anything else related to COVID… we are more than happy to share all of the factual information that we can.

We appreciate the cooperation from the entire community and the extraordinary efforts our staff has put forth to make this school year a success. I pray that we can put this virus behind us and return to some sense of normalcy soon, for the sake of our students. This is a stressful time for young people and we must not forget that their well-being and education are what concern us the most.