Dear Ms. Brown, Mr. Allen, and Mr. Gill,
These are complicated and challenging times. We have been grateful for the guidance we have received from OHA, ODE, and the Deschutes County Health Department to help us prepare to open our schools safely. As school leaders, we know that decisions are often complex and have competing priorities, and we have appreciated the thought and care that has been shown by your organizations.
Today, we are writing on behalf of over 1,000 children served by schools in Deschutes County. Given that Deschutes County has met the required metrics for three consecutive weeks and the State of Oregon's rate of infection is the lowest it has been in the last 10 weeks, we implore you to permit our schools to begin in-person learning for grades 4-12 the week of September 21st.
We understand that under the current guidelines, the state's test positivity rate of 5.6% would not allow our county's schools to reopen for in-person learning for grades 4-12. We understood the initial logic and intent of both the county case rates and test positivity metrics, and we agree that tracking this data is critical to understanding the public health situation both locally and statewide. However, the test positivity metric must be reexamined especially in light of the recent impact the wildfires had on testing in our state. We must not allow a narrow margin of flawed data to prevent over 1,000 children from the return to school their well-being so desperately requires.
In our view, the current 5.6% test positivity rate does not accurately reflect the current public health situation. In fact, we have seen consistently lower case counts each week over the last seven weeks and posted the lowest case count in recent months the week of September 6. The 5.6% test positivity rate clearly does not indicate that our infection rates are going up nor that our public health situation due to COVID is getting worse. In fact, the opposite is true.
As OHA has indicated, the tragic wildfires in our state are reducing both the number of people who are seeking COVID tests and our state's ability to process those tests. In the week of September 6, there were 11,466 fewer tests conducted than the week before - a 48% decrease. This reduction in testing is a clear factor in the 5.6% test positivity rate, and we feel that last week's test positivity metric must be reexamined and interpreted accordingly.
While we believe that the metrics were created in good faith to serve both our students and communities, we now feel that they are unintentionally harming our students by not allowing them to return to schools in a timely manner when it is now actually safe to do so.
In the immediate, we are writing to request that schools in Deschutes County be exempt from meeting the state test positivity metric for the week of September 6 and be allowed to bring students in grades 4-12 back to campus for in-person learning. We have already welcomed hundreds of K-3 students back to our schools safely, and we are confident that our current county metrics and wider state trends indicate that we are ready to do this for all students.
Moving forward, we would also like to ask ODE and OHA to reexamine the current requirements for meeting both the case counts and test positivity rates for three consecutive weeks. In our view, this requirement potentially inadvertently misrepresents the actual local and state public health situation and is an unfair burden to our schools. At a minimum we would ask that the state consider developing a formal appeals process to allow for unique situational factors.
We thank you for your time and consideration in this matter. Obviously, the week of September 21st is approaching quickly, and we would appreciate a timely response to our request. We have met 100% of the guidelines willingly because we want nothing more than to allow our students to return safely to in-person learning, and we are confident that both our schools and our county are poised and ready to do so. To that end, we ask for you to partner with us to permit us to give our students the opportunity to experience the everyday joys of learning, human connection, and love that our schools provide. They need it now more than ever.
Sincerely,
Deschutes County School Leaders
Julie Amberg
Head of School, Cascades Academy
Sam Adams
Head of School, Seven Peaks School
Amanda Ahern
Principal, Eastmont School
Nathaniel Brocious
Director, Waldorf School of Bend
Julie Manion
Head of Administration, St. Francis School
Gregg Pinick
Exec. Director/HoS, Trinity Lutheran School