EHS COVID-19 Procedures

Story by: Andi Fraser

There are new procedures at school this year due to COVID-19, such as masks all day, social distancing in classrooms, one way hallways, and a modified schedule.

Ron Abel, the Eudora High School principal, says the hallway system is to prevent over-exposure of students.

“The idea is to prevent an overexposure of students,” Mr. Abel said. .

“It isn’t a perfect system but I do think that it lowers the number of different contacts students are having each day.”

Sophia Nichols soph. says the hallway system works pretty well.

“Sometimes it affects me when I’m going across the school but overall it’s fine.”

Sophomore Ethan Gales thinks the hallway system isn’t too bad either.

“I don’t think it’s too bad but it works. It’s just for our safety and it doesn’t really affect me being late at all.” Gales states.

Some weeks our schedule is hybrid, which is going to in person school two days, with three days online either on Monday/Tuesday or Thursday/Friday depending if you are on an A day cohort or a B day cohort. We could also be fully online, or on a modified hybrid schedule, which is being in person for four days a week and completely online on one day of the week for a deep cleaning of the school. There is also a fully online option that students could choose at the beginning of the year. This all depends on what the school board decides for the week, and how many cases there were as the week went on.

If someone comes back with a high temp, they are sent to the nurse’s office to recheck the temperature or they are sent home.

Steve Splichal, the superintendent of Eudora Schools, explains that there is a little bit of wiggle room for the temperature checks in the morning.

“The mark is really set at 100.4 [degrees] so that’s still the case today. The mark for normal body temperatures is 98.6 [degrees] and you could have a 99 [degree] temp and it might be a little higher than what’s maybe considered normal but you wouldn’t meet that 100.4 [degree] threshold so there is a little bit because as humans we are all a bit different.” Splichal explains.

Sophomore Sophia Nichols says temp checks have changed her morning by how fast she can get to class.

“Usually I’m late to school so it kind of affects how fast I can get to class and when we have early morning band practice it’s hard to find a time to go get your temp checked,” said Nichols

The school encourages all the classes who can’t properly social distance in their classroom due to either the size of the classroom, or how many people are in the class, to find a new place to work for that class period. Some places are outside, in the commons in either the main building or the EdTec, or the gym. We now have 50 folding chairs to help outside learning.

Splichal talks about things the school had to change in regards to COVID-19, such as classes, activities, and scheduling.

“You start with something as simple as the masks and the social distancing, the changes to the schedules, the limitations for spectators at events, the things we expect the kids to do at practice to stay safe, [and] hand sanitizer,” Splichal explains. “We’ve also looked at clean practices, the disinfecting we do to keep kids and staff safe, limitations on visitors and the volunteers, we’ve put screening behaviors in place, trying to make sure if we’ve got some kids that’s not feeling the best that we’re not letting them into the building at the risk of others. Those are just a few of the things that come to mind.”