COVID-19 - Making Waves Academy Student & Family Updates

March 2022 Updates

Effective March 11th, California transitions its statewide universal indoor masking requirement in K-12 school settings to a strong recommendation and schools are to maintain or establish masking requirements for K-12 settings in their respective jurisdictions. Read below to learn more about the on-campus safety guidelines applicable to staff and students, effective Monday, March 14th, 2022.

Masking

• Staff and students are required to mask indoors and outdoors until further notice – we will revisit this requirement in early April. During the week of April 4th, the COVID Safety team will review the student vaccination data and case numbers to consider possible updates to the outdoor masking requirement.

• MWA will continue to allow for unmasked supervised outdoor athletic activities, including Health & Wellness. Physical distancing (at least 3-feet) is encouraged. This does not apply to activities such as recess, breaks, and lunch.

• Staff and students will be allowed to wear one of the following mask types: cloth, surgical, or KN-95. This means that all mask types, except face shields, are acceptable for students and staff.

• The Operations team will supply surgical and KN-95 masks upon request.

Testing

• Students are still required to test weekly on-campus. The COVID Safety Team will consider possible cadence modification to this requirement following the return from Spring Break.

• Staff under an exemption to the vaccination policy are still required to test weekly and submit results to HR at humanresources@mwacademy.org. We will consider cadence modification to this requirement pending updates from Cal/OSHA.

What informed our decision?

• Student and staff vaccination rates

• Ventilation in-doors

• Decrease in case numbers and/or outbreaks

• Current exposure model used for student isolation and quarantine

• Staff response survey data

  • Beyond the numbers, the following themes were present in the comments section: removing the outdoor masking requirement could make it harder to enforce indoor masking 

 

COVID Data 

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The infectious period begins two days before the onset of symptoms. If the case did not have symptoms, the infectious period is considered two days prior to the testing date. Students who were on campus two days prior to testing positive, are designated as “Positive On Campus”. A student designated as an on-campus case does not directly imply that the student contracted COVID-19 on campus. This is in alignment with the guidance by our local county health department.