Westmoreland County schools could face difficult closure decisions as coronavirus risk remains high

Westmoreland County school districts face difficult choices as the county’s coronavirus transmission risk is expected to remain “substantial” for at least another week when the state updates its three-tiered Early Warning Monitoring System.

Leaders will need to weigh student safety and legal liability as they decide whether to close schools and move to fully remote learning — which Pennsylvania health and education officials recommend in counties with the worst transmission rates for the virus.

The state Department of Education recommends such a move if the risk factor remains high for two consecutive weeks. Those are recommendations, however, not mandates. The ultimate decision lies with local school boards.

“School leaders and school boards make decisions best suited for their communities at the local level,” Nicole Reigelman, a Department of Education spokeswoman, said in a statement.

Coronavirus transmission risk in Westmoreland this week bumped up from “moderate” to “substantial” as the county’s incidence rate jumped from 90.7 to 140.9. The incidence rate measures the rate of new cases in a population. A rate of 140.9 means about 0.14% of county residents contracted the virus from Oct. 9-15.

The latest seven-day period ended Thursday. The state is expected to report an update Friday. School district leaders are waiting for those numbers to see if the incidence rate remains high, which it likely will given the number of cases reported in Westmoreland all week.

Over the past week, 635 new coronavirus cases were reported in the county — including 133 on Thursday, which was the second-highest daily increase since the pandemic started.

“We’d like to bring everybody back and guarantee the health and safety of all the students, and it’s difficult when you can’t eliminate risk,” said Gary Peiffer, superintendent of the Greensburg Salem School District.

It’s impossible for schools to maintain six feet of social distancing between students at all times, and many buildings are old and lack adequate ventilation, Peiffer said. However, there’s also a risk to staying home, he said. Many children rely on school to provide them a safe and stable learning environment.

Liability issues

School officials nationwide also are uncertain whether there might be any legal fallout from the pandemic. Officials fear that families of children who contract the virus could sue their child’s school district, according to an article published last month by Education Week.

Ever-shifting standards from federal, state and local health officials are difficult to keep up with, leaving districts uncertain of legal risk, Education Week reported.

The National School Boards Association, The School Superintendents Association, The Association of Educational Service Associations and others are lobbying federal lawmakers to include liability protections for school districts.

It would be difficult for plaintiffs to prove that their child became infected at school, but even if districts win, any lawsuits will be costly, Education Week reported.

“You’re going to have to show causation, and proving where your child contracted it may not be easy,” Morgan M. Masters, a lawyer with a Columbus, Ohio, firm that specializes in education issues, told Education Week.

Most school districts have liability insurance, and those in Westmoreland County have been taking steps to minimize their legal risk.

“Our Board of School Directors has been advised by our solicitor and has had conversations with our insurance providers in this regard to best situate the district to avoid litigation,” said Tammy Wolicki, superintendent of the Hempfield Area School District. “We are working to avoid liability by implementing and documenting our safety measures.”

Greensburg Salem offers fully remote education and asks parents to sign a waiver before their children return to school, Peiffer said. However, regulations are always changing and each school district is making its own decisions about how to manage the pandemic, which makes it tough to know what safety precautions are the right ones.

“Where does that put individual schools?” Peiffer said. “Because now schools are doing different things.”

Some are even moving to reopen, even as cases increase throughout the county — though not necessarily in their communities.

Kiski Area School District is still preparing to offer four days of in-person instruction, possibly as early as Nov. 2.

While Westmoreland as a whole remains high, that isn’t the case in Kiski Area communities, district Superintendent Tim Scott said this week. The incidence rate in the district’s geographic area was at 48.71 cases per 100,000 residents. Should that change, the district always could revert to online learning only, he said.

Like other school districts, Kiski Area consults with its solicitor and insurance provider about its decisions, but the threat of potential lawsuits is not the primary concern, Scott said.

“We do our jobs with integrity and fidelity because it’s the right thing to do, not because someone might sue us over it,” Scott said. “We can’t let the threat of a lawsuit prevent us from doing what we think is right for our kids and for our community.”

Hempfield Area, which has students attending in-person classes through a hybrid model, will consider many factors when deciding whether to close, Wolicki said. The high school is closed through Friday after a 12th student tested positive this week since Oct. 12.

The Department of Education recommends schools in counties with a “substantial” virus transmission risk remain closed until the risk level returns to “moderate” or “low” for two consecutive weeks, at which point students can return to school part-time under the recommended hybrid model.

“Our system is currently being stressed with the limitations of available substitutes for bus drivers, secretaries, teachers, nurses, and custodians,” Wolicki said. “On a much broader scale, the school system is a part of the larger community and as such, can contribute to or mitigate the spread.”