By Suzanne Bardwell
GISD Supt. Dr. Sedric Clark announced a district wide school closure Monday afternoon beginning Tuesday, Aug. 31 due to rising numbers of COVID-related absences among both students and employees. School will resume for all campuses on Tuesday, Sept. 7.
All extracurricular and athletic activities for the rest of this week are also cancelled including football and volleyball games. Dr. Clark reported an 8% attendance drop from the first full week of school and a 5% attendance drop from the second full week until this past Monday. He said that as of 3:35 p.m. Monday there were a total of 60 confirmed student positives and 11 (nine school and two auxiliary staff) confirmed employee positives with many non-confirmed or self-quarantined students and several non-confirmed or self-quarantined faculty and staff.
“With declining attendance from both adults and students and steadily increasing confirmed positive numbers, we felt that the decision to close and deep clean was best for us at this time,” Dr. Clark said. “While we had hoped to avoid any school closures, Gladewater ISD is committed to the health and safety of our Bear family.”
According to Clark the days will not need to be made up due to extra days that were built into the 2021-22 school calendar.
As of Monday, other East Texas school closing include: Frankston ISD, Garrison ISD, Groveton ISD, Kennard ISD, Leverett’s Chapel ISD, Martinsville ISD, Murchison ISD, Wells ISD and West Sabine ISD.