COVID-19 Protocols

Health ScreeningS

All individuals will be required to participate in a health screening, that includes: 

• Curb-side touch-less temperature check (approx. 30-sec each, individuals must have a temperature read of 100.3 or lower)
• Designated staff will scan and interview students for symptoms
• We ask that everyone remain in their car with masks on during the symptom and temperature check process.
• Once cleared, students will be asked to exit cars and keep their face covering on at all times 
• Health screening information will be documented and kept confidential 

Hand-Washing 

New sinks have been installed on the exterior of our campus buildings to allow students to sanitize prior to entering a building. Upon completion of the car scan and temperature check students will:

• Follow signage to safety get in line for sinks supporting 6’ physical distance 
• Students will be directed and guided by a designated staff member to wash their hands thoroughly for a minimum of of 20 secs using soap and water
• Students will fully dry their hands
• After washing, students will follow the signage to their path to their classrooms with direction from staff as needed.

Cleaning and Disinfection

Sea Crest School has updated its custodial contract to clearly specify the protocols required of the service provider to clean our campus in accordance with CDC and San Mateo County Department of Public Health guidelines. Procedures include:

• Cleaning: washing/rinsing/wiping methods, use of color-coded microfiber cloths to reduce the crossover contamination risk of using the same cloths to clean multiple spaces.
• Disinfecting: perform after cleaning, ensure ventilation, following manufacture instructions including PPE required, dilution rates, application methods, contact times and residue removal.

The service provider may only use cleaning products approved by the School and must store products securely away from students. In addition, the service provider must train all of their staff on these procedures. The contract also specifies all high-touch items that require daily disinfection on campus.

The School has also increased the frequency of cleaning. In addition to the regular nightly cleaning schedule, the School will have a custodial staff person on campus during the day to regularly clean and disinfect high-touch surfaces in common areas (e.g. door handles, railings, sink handles and restrooms).

The school consulted with Karen Wang, PhD and Director of Collaborative on Health and the Environment (CHE) to ensure school cleaning and disinfecting supplies are both safe and effective for students and staff. We are using Hydrogen Peroxide based products as they are effective disinfectants and safer than Quat or bleach based solutions. We have placed Hydrogen Peroxide based disinfecting cleaner in each room to facilitate regular disinfection by staff throughout the day.

Playground Equipment  

Students will wash or sanitize their hands prior to using playground equipment, and equipment will be restricted to one student cohort at a time. Custodial staff will clean high-touch playground surfaces (e.g. railings) during and after the end of each school day. 
 

All students must wear a face mask while at school, except during designated times (e.g. eating lunch), in accordance with the following guidelines:  

• Source: students are required to bring their own face covering from home. 
• Construction: face coverings must be made out of breathable cloth materials and are not surgical face masks, respirators, or personal protective equipment. 
• Functionality: face coverings must cover a student’s entire nose and mouth area, and be secured to the student’s head. 
• Cleaning & Maintenance: students and parents are responsible for maintaining face coverings with proper care and they should be washed regularly per CDC guidance. 
• Damage: face coverings that no longer cover the nose and mouth, do not stay on the face, are soiled, or have holes or tears are not acceptable and must be discarded. 

The School will have face masks or face shields available to students whose face coverings become lost or damaged while at school. 

Parents must help their children comply with CDC guidance on proper use, removal, and washing of cloth face coverings. Parents should discuss proper use of face coverings with their children, and have children practice wearing face coverings prior to the start of school.

Face masks that are otherwise attached to the student (e.g. with a strap around the neck) are strongly encouraged. If a student is wearing a face covering that secures to their ears, the student must bring a clean ziploc bag to safely store their face covering while they are eating.

Students with medical conditions or disabilities that prevent them from being able to wear a cloth face covering will be provided with accommodations which will be determined on a case-by-case basis consistent with the school’s policy on reasonable accommodation of students. Students not qualifying for accommodations and refusing to wear face coverings will be excused from campus and shift to Distance Learning.

Campus

Individuals on campus will maintain at least 6 feet of physical distance from each other at all times, to the greatest extent possible, and are prohibited from engaging in handshakes, hugs, or any other unnecessary physical contact with any other person while on campus. Employees will refrain from using another employee’s phone, desk, office, or other work tool or equipment.  

Employees will minimize movement and congregation, as much as practicable, in all campus environments including but not limited to, hallways, break rooms, the staff workroom, classrooms, restrooms, and playgrounds/outdoor spaces.
 
The School rearranged classrooms, office spaces, and other workstations to decrease the capacity for conference and meeting and to allow for 6 feet between individuals. If physical distancing between workspaces or between employees and students is not possible, the School may add physical barriers (such as a plexiglass shield) that cannot be moved to increase protection against airborne particles. Employees will enforce student  physical distancing measures throughout campus.  

Signage and Mapping 

The school has worked at creating a new campus flow to allow students and teachers access to classrooms primarily from external doors, clear and open walkways and designated spaces for student and teacher learning, breaks and play while keeping to social distancing. 

Eating and Play

The school has created a schedule and invested in additional outdoor play and eating spaces to allow students to safely eat and play and will maintain a 6 foot social distance from each other.  For the present time, outside lunch service will be suspended. Students are not permitted to touch or share others’ food. Teachers will be expected to manage their student group within their assigned designated area of the campus during recess and lunch, and will not be permitted to leave their designated area. 

Restrooms

Every grade level will be assigned restrooms throughout the campus to minimize cross cohort interaction. Faculty and staff will be assigned specific restrooms to use. All members of the community will be encouraged to take precaution when using the restroom, avoid touching surfaces and practice proper hygiene. Touch-less sinks and soap dispensers have been installed throughout the campus. 

Ventilation

Sea Crest School has no HVAC system in our Lower School and relies on fresh air from windows and exterior doors for ventilation, and radiant heating in the floor when the weather gets cooler. 

Our first floor Middle School classrooms all have large banks of windows and two-thirds also have exterior doors which will both be used for ventilation. When the weather gets cooler we use an HVAC system for heat. We have upgraded the HVAC filters to MERV 13 and increased the filter replacement schedule.

Staggered Drop-off and Pick-up

Our drop-off and pick-up, class, break and recess schedules have been staggered to allow for physical distancing practices and minimizing mixing of groups under the guidance of the CDC, California State Guidelines and San Mateo County. Please note that carpooling will not be allowed to help support students remaining in their cohorts. 

Classroom Access

Once students have completed the symptoms check, touch-less temperature check, and hand washing at drop-off, they will be guided to follow the signage to enter their classrooms from external access.

Recess & Lunch 

Student recess and lunch periods will be on a staggered schedule according to student cohort groups. Groups will be assigned to separate designated outdoor spaces for play activities and will not be allowed to mix with other student cohorts. Lunch will take place at designated outdoor tables. For the present time, outside lunch service will be suspended. Students are not permitted to touch or share others’ food. Teachers will be expected to manage their student group within their assigned designated area of the campus during recess and lunch, and will not be permitted to leave their designated area.  

Physical Education & Athletics

Student physical education and athletics will take place in the Sea Crest Event Center (gym) and outdoors in either the grass field or blacktop area. Teachers will develop instructions for appropriate physically distanced outdoor activities that are easy for students to understand and are developmentally appropriate. Activities will not involve physical contact between students and will enable students to maintain a distance of at least 6 feet from each other.   

Field Trips and School Assemblies 

Teachers are encouraged to plan virtual activities and events in lieu of field trips, assemblies, and on-site performances. The School will stagger use of communal spaces such as the outdoor spaces to minimize gatherings.

Except as authorized in writing by the Head of School, all School facilities will remain closed for student assemblies, performances, or other large gatherings, until further notice.    

Outdoor Classroom Space

The school will utilize the following outdoor classroom space for instruction, weather permitting: 

• grass field 
• mindfulness garden
• amphitheater
• school garden area
• nature play area
• blacktop (which will be divided up with barriers to physically separate cohorts)
• outdoor table areas

Teachers will plan to have access to technology to broadcast instruction due to support physical distancing (e.g., megaphone or microphone).  

Closed Campus

Sea Crest School will be closed to all visitors and parents throughout the operating hours of the school day. If a parent needs to come onto campus for an emergency reason, they must get clearance from Administration and complete the symptom scan and temperature check. All deliveries and outside vendors have been rescheduled to service the school outside of student hours. 

Meetings

Non-essential in-person meetings will be cancelled or postponed. Traditionally in-person essential meetings, including parent-teacher conferences, will be replaced with other means of communications, such as phone conferences or a virtual format. If an in-person meeting is held, it must take place in a location that allows all individuals to maintain a minimum distance of 6 feet and all individuals should sign-in to document attendees. Persons attending the meeting should disinfect the space they occupied during the meeting (e.g., chair, area of the table at which they sat), and the location used for the meeting must be cleaned and disinfected by custodial staff before it can be used again. 

Sea Crest is contracting with Eurofins Scientific (“Eurofins”) to conduct periodic COVID-19 testing of our employees.  Eurofins will send test kits to our school and tests will be administered by registered nurses.  Samples will be couriered to Eurofins’ local lab in Fremont, CA and they have committed to a 24-48 hour turn-around for test results. Employees will be tested prior to working with students on campus, and will be tested at least every other month thereafter.  
 

Sea Crest School is prepared to follow Contact Tracing guidelines as outlined in by the CDC and the San Mateo County Department of Public Health to help reduce the spread of COVID-19. We have a pandemic response/contact tracing coordinator that will be using the following guidelines for our school community:

• Interviewing people with COVID-19 to identify everyone with whom they had close contact during the time they may have been infectious;
• Notifying contacts of their potential exposure;
• Referring contacts for testing;
• Monitoring contacts for signs and symptoms of COVID-19; and
• Connecting contacts with services they might need during the self-quarantine period.

All communication related to contact tracing is private and confidential. 

To prevent the further spread of disease, COVID-19 contacts are encouraged to stay home and maintain social distance (at least 6 feet) from others until 14 days after their last exposure to a person with COVID-19. Contacts should monitor themselves by checking their temperature twice daily and watching for symptoms of COVID-19.

People with COVID-19 have had a wide range of symptoms reported – ranging from mild symptoms to severe illness.

These symptoms may appear 2-14 days after exposure to the virus:

• Fever
• Cough
• Shortness of breath or difficulty breathing
• Diarrhea
• Chills
• Repeated shaking with chills
• Muscle pain
• Headache
• Sore throat
• New loss of taste or smell

Symptom Checker

Use the CDC online tool to help you make decisions and seek appropriate medical care.
 

Sea Crest is committed to helping to reduce the spread of COVID 19 in our community while providing a safe environment for our students and teachers. Guidelines and procedures outlined in our Campus Reopening Plan, Family Handbook, Family COVID-19 Addendum, Employment Handbook and Employment COVID-19 Addendum are to be strictly adhered.

Sea Crest families, faculty and staff are all required to sign sign acknowledgement that they have been read and understood these handbooks in addition to a Community Pledge to ensure we are following the CDC and San Mateo County Department of Public Health guidelines on reducing the spread.

*As testing methods evolve, county guidelines are updated or vaccines become available, Sea Crest school will update our processes to best protect our community.