According to an email sent out on Wednesday, all unvaccinated seventh grade students at Marshall Fundamental have been quarantined after the City’s health department linked two cases of COVID-19 to students attending the school.
“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 report, 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.
Despite several emails sent earlier this week requesting information about a COVID exposure at Marshall and reports that some students have been ordered to quarantine over the past three days, the district did not provide a comment to Pasadena Now.
In its public report released on Wednesday afternoon, the district reported no additional cases among students or staff in the past 10 days.
Click to see PUSD’s COVID-19 Dashboard, released Wednesday, August 18
No new cases were listed at Marshall Fundamental in the past 10 days according to that report. PUSD schools opened one week ago.
The district did not respond to an email about the report.
The district came under fire for not mandating vaccinations of its teachers earlier this month.
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.
Get our daily Pasadena newspaper in your email box. Free.
Get all the latest Pasadena news, more than 10 fresh stories daily, 7 days a week at 7 a.m.
3 thoughts on “Marshall Fundamental Unvaccinated Seventh Graders Quarantined”
Yet again, we see evidence of a district that follows and never leads. As the district administration and board continue to cite, they are upholding the standards dictated by state government as if those rules are the be-all and end-all of safety precautions that can be implemented by PUSD. The superintendent continues to tout the dubious number of 96% vaccination rate amongst district teachers. If that number is correct (no evidence yet as to its validity), then why balk at getting that small remainder fully vaccinated?
Again, this comes down to a district that only follows. It’s a sign of weak leadership up and down the chain, but this failure sits primarily in the laps of Superintendent McDonald and School Board President Scott Phelps. I hope they have their retirement plans shored up.
How legit is their contact tracing???? Are they even doing it? How are the other grades not affected when different grades share the same common areas/hallways. As a parent of the school I am very unhappy. My kids have told me kids often do not wear their masks. They need to do more to protect the students vaccinated or not. It’s a proven fact that you can be fully vaccinated and still get Covid, I see it daily as a nurse.
The contact tracing is performed by the City-operated Pasadena Public Health dept., which has an excellent track record.