Indiana School Temporarily Closes After Positive Virus Test

ELWOOD, Ind. (AP) — A central Indiana school has shut down two days after opening after at least one staffer tested positive for COVID-19, while other districts in the state also are reporting positive tests among students and employees.

Elwood Junior Senior High School temporarily is closing this week, the Indianapolis Star reported. Several other people are in quarantine. No students were believed to have been in close contact with the staff members, according to the school district.

“Elwood Community School Corp. had staff members that tested positive for COVID-19 this week,” Superintendent Joe Brown said after an emergency school board meeting Saturday. “All of these individuals were tested prior to our school year starting.”

The reopening plan was working, but the district saw “more positive cases from staff members than we anticipated,” Brown wrote in a letter to parents.

The Elwood district is northeast of Indianapolis and has about 1,500 students. The district started its academic year Thursday. Students will receive instruction virtually this week before resuming their normal schedules.

Each school building in the district will be closed on Wednesdays throughout August for cleanings due to the coronavirus pandemic. On those days, instruction will be virtual. Athletic programs will continue.

Meanwhile, parents and caregivers of football players at an Indianapolis high school have been told to monitor their children after a player at Warren Central tested positive for the virus.

The Warren Township school district told those who had been in close contact with the student to quarantine for 14 days, WISH-TV reported. Classes start Thursday at Warren Central, which has 3,677 students and 178 full-time teachers.

District students in 6th-12th grades will participate in an in-person and virtual alternating day schedule, according to the district’s reopening plan. A completely virtual option is also offered.

Positive virus tests have been reported in other Indiana school districts.

LaPorte High School has suspended boys’ football, wrestling and tennis team activities due to a positive test in both the tennis and football program, the (Northwest Indiana) Times reported.

A New Palestine High School football player tested positive days before the school was set to open, Southern Hancock schools confirmed Saturday. Greenfield-Central schools confirmed Thursday night that a student tested positive for the virus on the first day of school.

The Avon school district said Thursday that it learned a high school staff member tested positive for COVID-19. That person had not been at the school during the week or in close contact with any employees or students, according to a district spokesperson.