Bed-Stuy School Under Investigation For Multiple COVID Cases: DOE

BED-STUY, BROOKLYN — A Bed-Stuy school has been put under investigation by education officials after multiple cases of coronavirus were detected this week, according to the Department of Education.

P.S. 308 Clara Cardwell — which also houses the EMBER Charter School for Mindful Education, Innovation and Transformation — was marked as under investigation on Friday on the DOE's interactive map detailing coronavirus cases across the city.

The investigation comes after at least eight classrooms between the two schools this week were fully closed or put under partial quarantine, meaning only a subset of students in a classroom are required to quarantine while others can keep attending school, according to the map.

At P.S. 308, five classrooms were fully closed, two were under partial quarantine and one classroom at EMBER was under partial quarantine.

Under DOE guidelines, schools are only closed if an investigation reveals that there is widespread transmission in the school.

The new rules have led to only six full school closures so far this year, far less than the hundreds of extended closures in the 2020-21 school year under previous guidelines. A total of 33 schools have been investigated this year for possible closure, according to the map.

The investigation at P.S. 308 is the second in Brooklyn this week.

On Wednesday, an elementary school in Park Slope was put under investigation, though DOE officials had cleared the school by Friday. There are still seven classrooms under full or partial quarantine at the Park Slope building.

In Bed-Stuy, P.S. 308 was one of 20 schools dealing with coronavirus cases in the neighborhood as of Friday.

Most of the schools were facing partial classroom quarantines while six had at least one full classroom closure, according to the map.

The cases come as the neighborhood, as well as the rest of New York City and state face a coronavirus uptick.

Citywide, seven-day positivity averages for the week ending Dec. 4 were the highest they have been since early September, data shows.

The ZIP code where P.S. 308 is located, 11221, had a 3.48 percent positivity as of Dec. 4, slightly higher than the citywide and Brooklyn coronavirus rates, which both stood around 3 percent, according to the data.

The school did not immediately respond to a request for comment.