A Notice of Contemplating Unwinding

Dear Harding Academy Learning Community,

I hope you are well and had a relaxing and restful Fall Break. I wanted to touch base with you all around the state of our COVID-19 mitigation strategies in the current context of the pandemic. We are actively discussing how we safely and responsibly unwind our mitigation framework. 

As I have said since the summer, we will consider the CDC guidelines, TN Department of Health, and Nashville Metro Health Department guidance for schools, as well as the data behind the potential medical impact of COVID-19 on our students (especially our youngest) to inform our approach to masks, quarantines, and contact tracing. While the broader national and Nashville community data are important, we will also focus on our more local independent school and Harding Academy communities where the vast majority of our family activities are taking place. 

Today we are seeing declining cases in the Davidson County area, low case counts in our Harding Academy community as well as the broader independent school community, and the real potential for vaccine availability for children ages 5-11 very soon.

Knowing an age 5-11 vaccine announcement is imminent, one thing remains clear from the school’s perspective: “in developing school safety plans for fall 2021, we need to acknowledge that the risk of COVID-19 to any one individual is most influenced by their vaccination status….Schools with high vaccination rates will navigate this school year much more easily than schools with lower vaccination rates, including elementary school settings where students have not yet been offered vaccination.” (Childrens’ Hospital of Philadelphia Policy Lab, Guidance for In-person Education in K-12 Educational Settings, July 2021). While not a requirement, the school encourages vaccination for all eligible members of the community as a means to minimize potential infection, to control the spread of COVID-19, and to limit the possibility of being considered a close contact of any individual who may have tested positive. 

As we continue to discuss how and when we unwind, we will continue to monitor these data points and likely take steps over time towards an eventual endgame of being mask optional. As always, things in the pandemic cannot be perfectly predicted and we may have to adapt. Key timing indicators for us will be the weeks following our various breaks coming up: specifically the weeks following Fall Break, Thanksgiving and Winter Break. If the trends above continue in the positive direction they have been following these breaks, that bodes well for our unwinding plans. 

Once we get to a mask optional place, “high vaccination rates, strong community commitment to testing when individuals feel ill with COVID like symptoms and low COVID-19 incidence make up the essential foundation for a mask-optional approach.” (Childrens’ Hospital of Philadelphia Policy Lab, Guidance for In-person Education in K-12 Educational Settings, July 2021). 

I will be communicating throughout as we continue to work to deliver on our mission.