VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — More than 25,000 students in Virginia Beach are back in classrooms. With that number expected to go up soon, school officials created a COVID dashboard to track coronavirus cars inside public school buildings and on school buses.
“That little bit of peace of mind for us is a really good thing,” explained parent Ginger Capps.
The COVID dashboard went live on the VB Schools website on Thursday. It allows anyone to constantly check the number of positive coronavirus cases in the district. Many parents said the new resource is needed to help monitor community spread.
Capps said, “I’ll be looking at the dashboard. I think it is important. I do worry, so I think we have to take the precautions and the dashboard is just one more awesome step to help us do it.”
The dashboard is a chart with dates a person with coronavirus was in a school building or bus, when families found out, and the number of cases.
“The dashboard will be updated every day at 10 a.m. so that if there are any new potential transmissions or any new cases, those will be updated,” explained VBCPS Chief Communications and Community Engagement Officer, Natalie Allen.
Allen said parents need to remember each positive COVID case on the dashboard is building-related.
“Multiple cases could potentially be one individual,” she explained. For example, if there was a school psychologist that visited three schools, that would be considered three cases because we want to showcase to families where potential exposures happened.”
Allen said if a positive case pops up in your child’s school, officials will notify you either by a letter or phone call. She said the notification would happen before it shows up on the dashboard.