News

HGEA MEMBERS KEEP SCHOOLS RUNNING
Since the COVID-19 pandemic started affecting Hawaii, principals and school staff – HGEA members – have been the ones reporting to work to keep our schools running. They’ve showed up to perform their duties, along with other duties of those who would not do them.

EXTRAORDINARY EFFORTS
Currently, principals and school staff are making extraordinary efforts to reopen schools despite many challenges.

DOH MUST NOTIFY MORE QUICKLY
Information from the Hawaii Department of Health about positive cases on campus is not coming fast enough for school administrators to promptly react and inform their school communities. HGEA supports Superintendent Kishimoto’s call for Department of Health contact tracers to be exclusively assigned to investigate COVID-19 cases within public schools. 

TIMELY DECISION MAKING NEEDED
To eliminate confusion, State level leaders and Complex Area Superintendents and their staff must provide timely decisions about what actions to take when there is a COVID-19 case on campus. There should be uniform standards statewide.

ALL MUST PITCH IN TO HELP AND WORK TOGETHER INCLUDING TEACHERS
As schools are set to reopen tomorrow, Aug. 17, 2020, principals are having to task school staff with new duties that they have never done before. To be successful for our students and communities, ALL school staff must pitch in and work together to help with these duties, and that includes teachers.

PROPER EQUIPMENT, TRAINING, TESTING AND NOTIFICATION NEEDED
We need to be united in this fight against COVID-19 and in our efforts to educate our students while keeping school staff and students as safe as possible. All schools and school employees must be properly equipped and trained, cleaning and disinfecting must be a priority, testing of those exposed and contact tracing of those positive must be timely in order to stop the spread of COVID-19, keep our communities healthy and properly educate our children.