12 Pleasanton Students Tested Positive For COVID-19 Last Week

PLEASANTON, CA — Twelve Pleasanton Unified School District students and three staff tested positive for COVID-19 amid back-to-school week.

The cases were reported from Aug. 7 to 13, according to the school district's COVID-19 dashboard. In all, the school district serves 14,000 students.

The students must isolate for 10 days, district spokesperson Patrick Gannon said in an email.

"We continue to urge families to keep students home if they are sick," Gannon wrote. "This supports the health of the entire community, as well as of the student and their family. "

One of these recent cases was at Foothill High School, which prompted Principal Sebastian Bull and Site Coordinator Joseph Viviana to send a letter to families over the weekend.

The administrators asked families to monitor for fever or COVID-19 symptoms such as a body temperature of 100 degrees or higher, cough, shortness of breath, chills, body aches, fatigue, sore throat, headache, runny nose or others associated with COVID-19.

Families receive a health screening form each morning, before students step foot on campus, and are required to answer questions related to COVID-19 symptoms, exposure or diagnosis, Gannon said. Parents are also asked to consider whether their responses necessitate testing or isolation.

Anybody who develops symptoms should contact a health care provider to determine whether a COVID-19 test is warranted and notify the district of their symptoms, Bull and Viviana said. People who test positive should also notify the district.

If a student tests positive, the district notifies families of students who have been within 6 feet of the sick student for a total of 15 minutes. Families are notified of the possible exposure date and what to do next, while the school community is notified that a case was confirmed on campus and reminded of health and safety protocols, Gannon said.

On campus, the district requires well-fitting masks indoors and outdoors, except when students are eating or engaging in some kinds of physical activity. Teachers are encouraged to keep seating charts to aid in contact tracing and keeping students in stable groups, Gannon said.

This story has been updated.