COVID-19 Update: Merced Union High School District students return to in-person classes

Teachers and staff at Merced Union High School District welcomed students back to campuses Monday for in-person classes, after holding remote learning classes for several months.

Although the COVID-19 pandemic is still ongoing, Merced County’s “red tier” state designation allows for the schools to reopen.

“I’m excited to be back,” said Golden Valley High School senior Camila Orozco. “I think distance learning was definitely a challenge.”

But it’s not business as usual, and district officials say they are taking special precautions due to the pandemic. That includes students being put on a A/B schedule, with half of the student body alternating days that they will be at school.

On their “off days”, students will log into their classes online. Families are being also given the choice to keep their students on distance learning for the remainder of the semester, which ends Jan. 15, according to a district news release.

All students will have school five days a week. The district recently purchased media equipment to allow teachers to broadcast their lessons simultaneously to the A and B students on their off-campus days, as well as full-time distance learners.

“(There’s) a lot of excitement in the air and certainly a little bit of anxiety, dealing with the newness of the protocols and life on campus for the first time,” said Alan Peterson, Superintendent of Merced Union High School District.

MUHSD schools include Merced, Golden Valley, Atwater, Buhach Colony, El Capitan, Yosemite, Independence, Sequoia, and Merced Adult.

About 60% of the district’s students opted to return for in-person instruction, Peterson said.

Back in September, several schools in Merced County were given waivers allowing them to reopen for in-person classes.

Local deaths, active cases, hospitalizations rise

As students returned to school, the Merced County Department of Public Health’s Monday report showed some notable upticks in COVID-19 data over the weekend.

Two more COVID-19-caused deaths of Merced County residents have been reported since Friday. The two new fatalities increased the total number of local deaths due to the pandemic since its start to 158.

One of the most recently deceased was male and the other female, both between 50-64-years-old, according to County Public Health. Each had underlying health conditions prior to their deaths.

New laboratory confirmed COVID-19 cases since Friday tallied 105. Saturday accounted for 31 of the additional cases, Sunday 39 and Monday 35.

A total of 9,779 known residents have contracted COVID-19 to date.

Of those cases, 404 are presumed to currently be active. That’s 100 more active cases than the prior Monday, and the highest active case count since Sept. 23.

Although an estimate, the number of active cases is based on the number of new laboratory confirmed COVID-19 cases during the past 14 days. The significant rise indicates that more residents have begun to test positive compared to recent weeks. Until recently, active cases had hovered slightly above and below the 300 threshold.

The county’s testing positivity percentage also increased only on Monday from 2.5% to 2.8%. The data point shows the percentage of residents screened for COVID-19 over the last week whose results return positive.

Testing positivity is one of the critical metrics looked at by the state to determine how much of a county’s local economy may reopen. Although Merced County’s percentage rose on Monday, it is still well within the necessary threshold for its current reopening tier.

The state updates county tiers once a week on Tuesdays.

Active hospitalizations of Merced County residents due to severe COVID-19 cases also rose by one patient to 28. Eight of those patients are hospitalized in local facilities, while the majority are cared for outside of the county.

Total residents having ever been hospitalized on account of the novel coronavirus increased by three patients to 701.

Active coronavirus outbreaks were unchanged since Friday. Twelve workplace locations are currently defined as having outbreaks, meaning they have not yet gone two weeks without a new laboratory confirmed case being traced back.

So far, 68,536 county residents have been screened for COVID-19 and 15.25% of tests have returned positive.

This story was originally published November 2, 2020 at 4:47 PM.