Dallas County Health and Human Services have issued an order for Dallas County schools to remain closed for in-person classes and other extracurricular activities until after September 7.
The authority has taken this step to ensure students not to get infected from coronavirus as the COVID-19 case rises in the area.
The order issued makes it clear that the schools will have to continue the virtual online classes. For teachers and other staff members of the schools can go to the schools but they will have to follow the mandatory social distancing and take other precautions including face covering.
I fully support @JudgeClayJ and @DrPhilHuangDFW on this decision👇🏽The safety of our children and teachers must be priority number one. pic.twitter.com/L5UIDipNSw
— Miguel Solis (@MiguelForDallas) July 16, 2020
Other events including clubs, sports, competitions, and sponsored events are not allowed, they will be on hold until the in-person classes start.
On Thursday, Dallas County is reported to have new more than 1,000 COVID-19 cases with 16 deaths. Thursday is marked as the fourth consecutive day for crossing the 1,000 new case mark. This trend may continue further maybe with some surge, so, this leads the authorities to take the decision for the delay.
Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins said, “This is not a one-time decision” at the Thursday press conference. “Unfortunately with the situation that we have here in Texas, there will be many decisions to be made,” he added.
Garland ISD praised and announced the compliance with a tweet, “Important – Per the Dallas County order issued today, July 16, Garland ISD schools will not reopen for on-campus, face-to-face instruction until after Sept. 7. All students will attend school remotely Aug. 10-Sept. 7: http://garlandisd.net/COVIDupdates.”
Apart from this, many schools such as Duncanville, Cedar Hill, and DeSoto of the districts falling under Dallas County decided to start the school year from September 8. They will not allow the campus to function until Labor Day.
Michele Townes, coordinator for the planomoms.com and a mother on Thursday said, “Today was the deadline to register for at home or face to face. I know a lot of parents like myself left it to the last day.”
Then she chooses to keep kids at home saying, “We chose at this point to keep kids at home.”
She also said that majority of the parents have health concerns about their kids because the school reopening has been decided by a health official even there is a spread of COVID-19. “There is a little bit of concern that decision is made by a non-elected official not in the education realm.”
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