Baton Rouge / louisianaradionetwork.com
Board of Elementary and Secondary Education President Sandy Holloway calls Superintendent of Education Cade Brumley’s plan to allow parents to decide if their child should stay home if there was a possible COVID exposure, abrupt and inconsistent with what health officials recommend. Fellow BESE member Kira Orange Jones agrees.
“This is a rogue, irresponsible action that really didn’t give many constituents the opportunity to weigh in on something as important as this,’ said Jones.
Brumley’s directive states that school systems have a choice of whether or not they implement parental choice when dealing with possible virus exposure and quarantining kids. His concern is the huge number of kids missing school and classroom interaction with classmates.
Jones, who represents District 2 on the Board of Elementary & Secondary Education says Brumley should have run his idea past BESE first.
“Many BESE members haven’t had the opportunity to even understand the policy or its implications,’ said Jones.
Some school systems are implementing this new parent choice option, while others are not changing their quarantine rules, which means students will have still have to quarantine after they have close contact with a person who is COVID positive.
Jones says she’d like to talk with state health officials and medical experts about Brumley’s policy.
“Really assess the ways in which it does or doesn’t fly in the face of what we know is in the best interest of keeping students and school communities safe,” said Brumley.
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