With some private and charter schools in San Francisco being allowed to reopen for in-person instruction this week via a waiver application process, the city's Department of Public Health on Tuesday launched an interactive dashboard tool for parents and students to track school reopenings.
The new dashboard will be updated daily at 9 a.m. with real-time information such as which schools have applied for reopening, and whether they've been approved.
Although the San Francisco Unified School District has said in-person instruction likely won't happen this semester, more than 80 parochial, private and charter schools have requested a waiver application, and 40 have already submitted their applications.
The waiver process involves schools submitting a COVID-19 safety plan to city health officials. Approvals for elementary schools are being done on a rolling basis.
Then next month, some middle schools may also be allowed to reopen through the waiver process, and high schools are expected to follow sometime in November.
"We are making sure that schools can reopen for in-person learning with strong safety guidelines," Dr. Grant Colfax said in a statement. "The standards and safety plans that schools implement will help mitigate risk for students and staff returning to in-person learning environments."
Colfax said last week that city health officials were already starting to inspect schools set to reopen, checking for things like classroom structure and ventilation systems.
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For the dashboard, SFDPH teamed up with DataSF and the city's COVID Command Center. The dashboard and more information about the city's school reopening plan can be found at https://data.sfgov.org/stories/s/School-Reopening/ccmh-3avz/.
