COVID-19 Update

Case Numbers Update 

At St. John: The school continues to see an increase in positive COVID cases, consistent with increasing cases in the community. Over the past week, there have been clusters of cases (3 or more positive cases in one homeroom) in Grades 8, 7, 5, 4, and 1, leading to additional recommendations provided specifically to those cohorts (including mask-wearing through next week and serial rapid testing). The school’s Covid Response Team maintains communication with an investigation team at Public Health – Seattle & King County (PHSKC). 

The Covid Response Team continues to track positive cases and communicates with families of positive students. It appears many of the positive cases have likely occurred through community or household spread (parents/siblings, weekend gatherings, events outside of school) rather than classroom spread. The school remains committed to our mitigation strategies. Data on cases, broken down by grade level and homeroom, is available here.   

COVID Weekly Data Dashboard (5/5-5/12)  

  • Students Tested Positive (grades preK-8): 36* 
  • Staff (School and XDC) Tested Positive: 1 

*This is a 5.5% increase from the week of 4/28-5/5. COVID-19 is still here in our community. We are providing these numbers as a reminder to stay strong with your mitigation measures. Please continue to use easily accessible prevention measures. Keep testing your students and families – the school has an abundant supply of rapid tests available in the main office. Monitor students for symptoms (and keep students home who are ill), and mask as appropriate to limit spread and lower individual and community risk.  

In King County: King County continues to be in the “Medium Transmission” level (over 200 new cases per 100,000 people over a 7-day period), and case rates continue to increase. As of 5/7/22, case rates were 311/100k (compared to 279/100k the previous week).   

A Note on Potential Classroom Closures  

You may be wondering whether classrooms will move to remote learning as a result of the increase in positive cases. At this time, it is NOT a recommendation of PHSKC to move to remote classrooms. The school will only consider a remote option if there is not adequate staffing to cover all classes in the school. We will continue to implement mitigation measures related to case clusters as recommended by PHSKC, including masking, increased testing, and reminders to keep students home if they have symptoms. 

Thank you for your support and continued commitment to the health and safety of our St. John community. Contact covidresponse@st-johnschool.org to report positive student cases or if you have further questions.