Central Bucks School Board Signals Support Of Modified Quarantine

DOYLESTOWN, PA — The Central Bucks School Board appears poised to implement a modified quarantine policy at its next board meeting.

Board members held a special meeting Wednesday to discuss the policy, which allows students who have come into close contact with someone who tested positive for coronavirus but are asymptomatic to return to school, provided they wear a mask at all times except when eating or drinking and remain at least six feet away from others.

Under current school district policy, students who have been exposed to someone who tested positive for coronavirus must stay home for 10 days, regardless of whether or not they present symptoms or test positive for the virus.

Bucks County Health Director David Damsker attended last week's school board meeting, where he answered questions from the board regarding modified quarantine, a policy he has supported since school districts began discussing a return to classrooms last summer. While the Pennridge and Palisades school districts implemented the policy months ago, Central Bucks ultimately took the more cautious approach recommended by the Centers for Disease Control.

Damsker has said there is little to no evidence of in-school transmission of the virus.

A majority of the nine-member board expressed a willingness to move to a modified quarantine policy, the language of which must be added to the district's health and safety plan and voted on by the school board before it can be implemented.

Earlier this week, Superintendent John Kopicki cautioned that some schools may have to close if coronavirus cases continue to rise at their current pace. Board member John Gamble said he still supports modified quarantine despite the recent spike in reported COVID-19 cases in Bucks County.

"I get that our numbers are going up, but they’re not going up because of anything that’s going on in our building," Gamble said. "Our teams have been phenomenal in cleaning our buildings. There is no evidence there is spread in our school. If there was, I would be voting the opposite way."

Board member Lorraine Sciuto-Ballasy said she supports modified quarantine but feels the timing isn't right.

"With the variants, the rises in cases and the emails we've received, I've given it a lot of consideration and decided that now is not the right time to do it," she said.

The school board's next meeting will be held at 7:30 p.m., Tuesday, April 13, at the Central Bucks School District's Educational Services Center, 16 Welden Drive, Doylestown. If you can't attend in person, audio of the meeting will be live-streamed here and archived for later listening here.

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