Each Monday morning, the Community Colleges of Spokane reports the number of COVID-19 cases, updated weekly, in their employee newsletter.
“We report our number of COVID-19 cases every Monday morning in our employee newsletter,” said Communications director, Lorraine Nelson.
Two weeks ago, this is the report that came out for SFCC:
“As of Friday, Jan. 22, at 3 p.m, Spokane Falls Community College reported 8 COVID-19 cases since January 4, the first day of winter quarter,” Nelson said.
There is a statement in their newsletter that is in place to let people know who is included in the report of COVID-19 cases for CCS. It states that it is the number of confirmed cases reported from employees and students who have been in CCS district offices or campuses while being contagious. The number doesn’t include those who have not been to CCS offices or campuses. They also don’t include Head Start/ECAP/Early Head Start infants and children, nor students at the Airway Heights Correctional Facility.
At the other college, Spokane Community College (SCC), there have been 9 cases since the start of winter quarter on January 4, and in the rest of the District there have been 6 cases. That being said, as of January 22 at 3 p.m., a total of 23 cases have been reported since the start of the quarter. By comparison, there have been a total of 25 cases in the entire district, which includes both colleges, during all of fall quarter from September 21 through December 11.
After getting updated results on Feb. 5th, 2021 at 3 p.m., this is what it looked like:
“As of 3 p.m. today, SFCC has had 18 COVID-19 cases since January 4; SCC has had 19: the District – which includes the Head Start employees as well as those in the central administrative offices – has had 7,” replied Nelson.
In just one week, the community colleges both had an increase in cases by 10 since January 4th, the start of winter quarter. The rest of the district only had one other since the last report came out.
As far as someone testing positive for COVID-19, returning to campus goes two different ways. There are checklists that are reviewed to make decisions on this.
“These are the checklists that we refer to constantly as we gather the information and decide when a quarantine is necessary, and then when the student can return,” said McCall Fadeley, executive assistant to the vice president of student services.
The number of days before you can return to campus after testing positive for COVID-19 can go two ways. If you show symptoms, you have to be away longer than if you don’t, in case you start to develop symptoms later on.Showing symptoms is 10 days of isolation before returning and no symptoms is 14 days. If someone is fever free for 24 hours after the 10 days without using fever reducing-medications and all symptoms have gone away, they can return to campus. For the 14 days, someone can return after those two weeks if they are symptom free.