Observations from the ‘COVID Tank’

Take a look at what happens inside the Waiting Room, home base for pandemic related operations at USN. If anyone in your household has symptoms of the virus, remember to keep students home until the test results are back.
By Margee Brennan, MD, Health Team Director

This summer when we started working out the details of what the Health Team would require once we got back to school in person, we realized pretty early on that we would need a fairly large space with room to physically distance students who presented with COVID-19-like symptoms while they waited for their parents to come pick them up. Because of it’s spaciousness and access to the 19th Avenue entrance, the USNA Office became the Waiting Room. It is, in fact, the place where students wait for their ride home, sometimes because they have viral symptoms, sometimes because we’ve learned that they have a close contact at home or school and need to quarantine. Other times they come to be screened on their way into school because the Magnus Mobile app wasn’t working for them that day. The Waiting Room has become the base of USN COVID-19 operations. After some big contact tracing events, we nicknamed it “the situation room.” We have heard parents and students refer to it as “the quarantine room” and “the COVID tank.” We are grateful to USNA Office Manager Deb Alberts for sharing this room with us; and by sharing I mean, giving it to us for the time we need it. Thanks, Deb.

So in the eight weeks or so that we have been working in “the tank,” we have learned quite a bit about the practical aspects of dealing with COVID-19 in a school setting. In September, we were able to come back to school because the local numbers were better and our mitigation steps were in place. We can clearly see that students appreciate being here in person, learning, and connecting with their peers and teachers. We even see some burst into tears when they find out that they need to go home because of a symptom or two or that they need to quarantine because someone in their network has had a positive test. 

With the increasing prevalence of COVID-19 in the metro area and across the United States, we add this request: if anyone in your household has symptoms in the vicinity of COVID-19, please keep your students home until the test results are back. It’s possible, likely even, that an ounce of precaution could help prevent the need for a pound of cure. We are updating our Health Team FAQs to reflect this.

We appreciate your patience, cooperation, and understanding of the measures we are taking to protect the USN community even when those measures are inconvenient.

Know that we are here to help navigate the path ahead.
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USN Mission: 
University School of Nashville models the best educational practices. In an environment that represents the cultural and ethnic composition of Metropolitan Nashville, USN fosters each student’s intellectual, artistic, and athletic potential, valuing and inspiring integrity, creative expression, a love of learning, and the pursuit of excellence.