Following last week’s announcement that schools in the Central Kenai Peninsula would be opening to 100% remote-learning, rather than opening schools for traditional on-site learning, parents in Nikiski have often questioned why their community schools are closed despite the majority of the cases leading to the High Risk closures being in Kenai and Soldotna.
As of Monday morning, the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services only reports one active case of COVID-19 among Nikiski residents.
John O’Brien, Superintendent of the Kenai Peninsula Borough School District, told KSRM on Monday that the counts are inherently prone to miscounting Nikiski residents: “Some of the cases that are being reported as ‘Kenai’ are actually Nikiski residents. Depending on where you live along the North Road, what your address is, or if you have a P.O. Box in Kenai, like I do. I live in Nikiski, but I have a P.O. Box in Kenai. If I were to contract COVID-19, I would actually be counted as a Kenai case. So, just because the DHS map shows zero cases in Nikiski, that is not accurate. Public Health has confirmed to us that depending on where you live, what your address is on the North Road, or if you have a P.O. Box in Kenai, some of those cases that are reported as Kenai cases are actually Nikiski.”
He also said that the aim is to protect students and teachers who commute to Nikiski schools: “We have staff members from as far away as Sterling and Kasilof that are commuting all the way out to Nikiski North Star and Nikiski High School to teach. We have students coming in from other communities. Because we have open-enrollment, there is lots of cross-enrollment between schools, and definitely people who live in one community but work at one of our schools in another community.”
The district will continue evaluating the risk statuses of all three divisions of the KPBSD, and they hope to open Central Peninsula schools on September 8, the day after Labor Day. That is not guaranteed, and depends on further numbers.
The risk determination is made in conjunction with the State of Alaska 14 day test counts, state seven day averages of positive cases, Public Health, the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services, the Alaska Department of Education and Early Learning, Kenai Peninsula cooperators, and the KPBSD COVID-19 Community Risk Level Medical Advisory Group. Superintendent O’Brien confirmed that this data will be utilized throughout the 2020-21 school year.
