Ninety-one members of the staff of Clayton County Schools and 19 students have contracted the coronavirus since July, the district reported in its recently launched COVID-19 dashboard.
The south metro Atlanta school system, which has been all virtual since the beginning of the 2020-2021 academic school year, said on Wednesday that it created the dashboard to be more transparent about the impact the coronavirus is having on the district.
“Since the onset of the pandemic, our school district has operated and made decisions that we feel have placed the safety of our employees, students, and community members at the forefront,” Morcease Beasley, superintendent of the school system, said in a release. “These decisions have been made based on feedback from stakeholders and data provided by local, state and national health organizations.”
Metro Atlanta school systems have taken different approaches to reporting COVID-19 infections, with some keeping mum on cases to protect privacy and others giving limited public numbers. Clayton said that the data it releases will be updated weekly using a five-day reporting time frame.
Clayton Schools has remained virtual-only because the county’s infections rates have failed to fall below 100 cases per 100,000 people for at least 14 consecutive days. Beasley early this week warned that remote learning could continue well into the new year because of surging numbers and the start of flu season, which could exacerbate infections.
