How this school division in Winnipeg is tracking COVID-19 absences
A school division in Winnipeg has launched an online dashboard that tracks absenteeism to help students, staff and families monitor the impact of COVID-19.
On Tuesday, the Louis Riel School Division (LRSD) launched two dashboards online that allow the public to view the self-reported absences.
"We felt it was important to make these dashboards available to families and staff to help the community see what we're seeing with respect to absences and the trends we're seeing, the patterns we're seeing," LRSD superintendent Christian Michalik told CTV News.
"It provides the community with a glimpse of what we see and hopefully reassures the community that the health and wellbeing of students and staff are front and centre for us."
The development of the dashboards comes after the province announced it would no longer provide close contact notification or letters on individual COVID-19 cases in school. Instead, the province said schools will now provide reports of absenteeism through the regular notification channels to the school community and will monitor staff and student absenteeism and self-reported COVID-19 cases.
One dashboard tracks overall student absence rates and the other tracks COVID-19-related student absences which could be due to a positive test result, a student showing symptoms, or a student in isolation due to the virus.
A third dashboard is being developed to track staff reported absences.
Michalik pointed out the information on the dashboards is only as accurate as the self-reported data parents provide the school.
"Having said that, I'm so impressed by how vigilant everyone's being," Michalik said. "How vigilant parents and guardians are being in sharing that information, and how vigilant our clerical staff in LRSD are to listen carefully and to record that information."
He said the division is being careful not to have any identifying information appear on the dashboards.
The data is backdated to the beginning of the school year, which Michalik said will help parents see patterns and trends.
"Seeing that timeline was important to see patterns, to understand trends, to see what the baseline has been this year in a pandemic, and where things are trending," he said.
The data in the dashboards are updated at the end of every school day at 4:30 p.m.
-with files from CTV's Charles Lefebvre
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
More than 115 cases of eye damage reported in Ontario after solar eclipse
More than 115 people who viewed the solar eclipse in Ontario earlier this month experienced eye damage after the event, according to eye doctors in the province.
Toxic testing standoff: Family leaves house over air quality
A Sherwood Park family says their new house is uninhabitable. The McNaughton's say they were forced to leave the house after living there for only a week because contaminants inside made it difficult to breathe.
Decoy bear used to catch man who illegally killed a grizzly, B.C. conservation officers say
A man has been handed a lengthy hunting ban and fined thousands of dollars for illegally killing a grizzly bear, B.C. conservation officers say.
B.C. seeks ban on public drug use, dialing back decriminalization
The B.C. NDP has asked the federal government to recriminalize public drug use, marking a major shift in the province's approach to addressing the deadly overdose crisis.
OPP responds to apparent video of officer supporting anti-Trudeau government protestors
The Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) says it's investigating an interaction between a uniformed officer and anti-Trudeau government protestors after a video circulated on social media.
An emergency slide falls off a Delta Air Lines plane, forcing pilots to return to JFK in New York
An emergency slide fell off a Delta Air Lines jetliner shortly after takeoff Friday from New York, and pilots who felt a vibration in the plane circled back to land safely at JFK Airport.
Sophie Gregoire Trudeau on navigating post-political life, co-parenting and freedom
Sophie Gregoire Trudeau says there is 'still so much love' between her and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, as they navigate their post-separation relationship co-parenting their three children.
Last letters of pioneering climber who died on Everest reveal dark side of mountaineering
George Mallory is renowned for being one of the first British mountaineers to attempt to scale the dizzying heights of Mount Everest during the 1920s. Nearly a century later, newly digitized letters shed light on Mallory’s hopes and fears about ascending Everest.
Loud boom in Hamilton caused by propane tank, police say
A loud explosion was heard across Hamilton on Friday after a propane tank was accidentally destroyed and detonated at a local scrap metal yard, police say.