Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, USD116 has carefully reviewed guidance from public health officials and is committed to ensuring the protocols we put in place keep our students, staff, families, and community safe. 2023-2024, the following protocols will be in effect.

Positive Cases

All students and staff are required to provide the District with an immediate notification of a positive case. For students, notification should be sent to the attendance office for secondary or call the main office for PreK and Elementary, who should then notify the building nurse.

For staff, please contact your school administrator and inform them of your positive result.

Students and staff who are confirmed cases of COVID-19 will be excluded from school and may not return until at least five (5) calendar days have passed since symptoms began (if symptomatic) or five (5) calendar days have passed since the positive test (if asymptomatic). 

The date of symptom onset (if symptomatic) is Day 0. The date of the positive test is Day 0 for asymptomatic individuals.

In addition to waiting five days, symptomatic individuals may not return until they are fever-free without fever-reducing medication for 24 hours, diarrhea/vomiting ceased for 24 hours, and other symptoms have resolved or improved.

Masking (except during meals and outdoors) is encouraged between Days 6-10 of an individual’s return.

We are not excluding asymptomatic close contacts at this time.

Symptoms of COVID-19

For symptomatic individuals, testing is an important tool to determine whether symptoms are due to COVID-19 or some other illness. Students and staff are strongly encouraged to stay home when they are sick. If you have any of the following symptoms, testing before returning to school or work is strongly recommended: 

• Fever (oral temperature of 100.4 or greater) 
• New onset of moderate to severe persistent headache 
• Shortness of breath 
• New cough 
• Sore throat 
• Vomiting 
• Diarrhea 
• New loss of sense of taste or smell 

COVID-19 tests are available for distribution, in limited supply, from each school’s building nurse. Please contact the nurse if you would like a test.

Protocols Update

USD116 reserves the right to update these protocols based on data and guidance from other entities or our local public health department.