Capitol News

Lansing School District’s director of health and wellness gave an update on COVID protocol at the April 6 board meeting.

Susan Wheeler provided a brief update on COVID results, which are still carefully monitored although Wheeler admitted it has been less stressful than it has been in the past. The state and county reported some of the lowest levels in months, however the school district had a two-week spike in March leading to some of their highest case numbers since October.

The good news is that since students have returned from Spring Break, there have been fewer reported cases.

“The COVID coordination team is continuing to monitor reported cases and continues to provide contact tracing and in-school testing, which has certainly led to decreased transmission at school,” said Wheeler. “We provided take-home tests for all staff and any interested students prior to spring break. This week we've had only five cases reported so far. The COVID team also has begun to participate in the multiplex testing program, which was offered through the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services. The multiplex are rapid tests, but they test for flu A, flu B and COVID. This required special training and special equipment, which the COVID team completed. We're starting this testing at Beekman, Dwight Rich, Gardner and each high school.”

Beyond the additional virus testing and mitigation efforts, the district also continues to offer mental and emotional health support to students, as well as overall quality of life services, expanding their programming this year to include Vision to Learn.

Vision to Learn is a nonprofit organization that provides vision testing and glasses to students, all free of charge. The district piloted this program last year, working it around the state mandated and supplied vision testing that occurs for all students in odd grades. The program will complete almost 700 exams this year and has already supplied 113 pairs of glasses.

Wheeler also shared an update on the BIPOC care closet, a program that supplies products to their students of color who are in need. The program officially launched on March 17 and the district received 450 requests for items in the first 24 hours. There are now up to 600 requests across 25 schools.

Families can use the link sent through district emails or the QR code posted at schools to put in requests to pick up items they need from sanitary supplies to snacks.