Surprisingly most of the Hennessey Public School students who’ve tested positive for COVID-19 “are in fifth grade and down,” Superintendent Dr. Mike Woods said at the Sept. 15 school board meeting.

That’s opposed to CDC reports that those age groups are less likely to get the virus and state Health Department numbers also bear that out.

Only seven students and one staff member have tested positive for the virus since the start of school Aug. 6 and four were in the elementary school, one in the pre-K/kindergarten building, and one each in the middle (eighth grader) and high schools, Woods told board members.

He didn’t say where the staff member worked.

Woods said the school provides information to the Kingfisher County Health Department and, so far, there have been no student-to-student COVID cases.

“It always comes from home-to-student,” Woods said.

Students quarantined

After he said he didn’t know the number of students that had been quarantined, two board members and a visitor in the audience said there were 13 or 14 in their child’s class.

Board President Dr. James Matthew Matousek, Clerk Cristopher Choate and parent Chandra Seiger all have a child in the same classroom.

Ryan Cooper, another parent in the audience, said, “We have twins (in the Early Childhood Center). One was quarantined and the other one wasn’t.”

Matousek said he read somewhere that people were more likely to die from a car wreck than with COVID-19.

Seiger said she didn’t like that her daughter had to wear a mask.

“This should not be normal for kids…I want them to be taught in the classroom,” she said.

“If we have too many with COVID, they will shut us down,” Woods added.

Travel rules/mask questions

Woods said they’d updated extracurricular travel requirements that included masks in transit and no stops on the way.

“CDC guidelines change regularly,” Woods noted.

He said a student from another school who’d tested positive showed up to play softball, but wasn’t allowed to participate.

“Do teachers wear masks in the classroom?” asked Luke Lough, board member.

“It’s at the teacher’s discretion,” said Stacey Schovanec, Early Childhood Center principal. “In the pre-K if they have enough space between students and themselves they don’t…We have mask breaks.”

Lough said a parent told him their child had to email the teacher if they had questions because they were “not allowed to approach the teacher.”

“It would surprise me...if that would happen,” Schovanec said.

Principals Angela Avila (mid-high school) and Barry Crosswhite were also at the meeting. A parent who did not address the board that evening stayed after the meeting and spoke to Crosswhite.

Mask and other requirements are posted on the school’s website at the top of the page under Coronavirus information.

40 virtual instruction students

Woods said 40 students have opted for virtual classes: K (1); First Grade (5); Second (2); Third (none); Fourth (2); Sixth (1); Seventh (3); Eighth (2); Ninth (6); 10th (4); 11th (6) and 12th (8).

The board approved these teachers to oversee virtual instruction ($200/subject/student/semester) for students: Tammie Broomfield, Marie Parrish, Amy Rawlings, Valerie Shamburg and Cindy Woods.

Other personnel matters

Also OK’d was paying these six teachers $20 an hour for the school year as after-school and/or Saturday school tutors for first-third graders: Flo Conway, Amy Hochstrasser, Kaitlyn Norton, Jessica Melendy, Chelsey McArthur and Kati Matthews.

The board approved 3-1 an extra-duty “correction” in pay of $1,500 to David Redus for summer football.

Lough asked if the pay was included in the total amount approved earlier by the board. Woods said it wasn’t. Lough cast the lone “no” vote.

Finances and more

Woods said the September gross production check was $136,000 compared to August ($79,000) and July ($60,000), “but that’s still $126,000 less than this time last year.”

He also said the budget for the new school year is $11.3 million.

Earlier in the meeting the board approved its budget (estimate of needs) produced by the district’s auditor under seven items in the consent agenda.

Also in the consent agenda were these items: co-op with Dover to provide alternative education; allow family and consumer science course to be counted as high school credit in the eighth grade, and declared these items surplus – 1994 Ford van, 3/4 ton Club Wagon with lift gate (66,493 miles); eight LocknCharge 30-count charging carts, seven Lockn-Charge 20-count charging carts.