Pasadena Unified officials delayed responding to questions from Pasadena Now for days about possible cases of COVID-19 at Marshall Fundamental School before the school’s principal notified parents of the exposures and called for a quarantine of unvaccinated students in the school’s 7th grade.
Hours before Marshall Principal Lori Simone Touloumian sent out emails notifying parents that the Pasadena Public Health Department had informed the school about the cases, the District published an inaccurate COVID-19 dashboard which said the district had experienced no new cases of COVID-19 among students or staff in the past 10 days.
After Pasadena Now published two stories Thursday about the confirmed cases and the District’s apparently faulty dashboard, the District updated the dashboard and Superintendent Brian McDonald apologized.
“Under the press of multiple obligations in the last few days, we didn’t get this week’s COVID-19 Dashboard right. For that, we apologize,” McDonald said in a statement Thursday. “We have taken immediate steps so that it is as accurate as possible in the future.”
Meanwhile, Pasadena Public Health Department spokesperson Lisa Derderian said the Department is “investigating several cases and working in consultation with PUSD to provide guidance and recommendations.”
Parents have expressed outrage and concern about the District’s handling of the situation in calls and emails to Pasadena Now and on social media.
The events come in the wake of the School Board’s refusal to agendize and vote on a vaccination policy for the District. Despite the pleas from local parents and Mayor Victor Gordo, the item never came up for a vote.
Last week Gov. Gavin Newsom announced a statewide policy requiring all school teachers and employees in the state to show proof of COVID-19 vaccination or submit to weekly testing.
Parents first became aware of the infections at Marshall in Touloumian’s emails Wednesday night.
“We have informed Marshall Fundamental 7th-grade parents and guardians that the Pasadena Public Health Department informed us this evening that it has found evidence that two confirmed cases of COVID-19 are epidemiologically linked,” the email from Marshall Principal Lori Simone Touloumian reads.
The letter was sent out to families of students attending the school.
“This means that the infected persons share a common membership at school (e.g., classroom, school event, school extracurricular activity, academic class, sports teams, clubs, transportation). The two confirmed cases have been present at some point in the same setting during the same time period while infectious within a 14-day period,” the letter continues.
According to the emails, the district is implementing additional infection control measures as directed by the Pasadena Public Health Department Exposure Management Protocol and immediately quarantining all unvaccinated seventh graders.
“All other Marshall grades will remain open,” the letter states.
COVID-19 testing will be available for all Marshall seventh graders at a drive-thru clinic hosted at the Pasadena Unified Education Center at 351 S. Hudson Ave., from 8 a.m. to 3:45 p.m., beginning Monday, Aug. 23.
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2 thoughts on “Reporting Delays and Errors, Quarantines, Fearful Parents: COVID-19 Casts Pall Over PUSD’s First Week Back to School”
Pasadena Now…Please keep a close eye on PUSD, they tend to do many “mistakes” I would’nt be surprised if perhaps you”ll get to the part were they don’t release information.
Instead of criticize, let’s all find out what we can do to support our public schools and keep our students safe. The community has no idea of the extent of the challenges administration, staff, and teachers face.