photo by: Sylas May/Journal-World Illustration

Douglas County’s school virus guidance will remain the same for a third straight week, despite the number of cases for the coronavirus continuing to fall.

Lawrence Douglas County Public Health announced Thursday its recommendation to schools would remain in the yellow tier, which calls for schools to use hybrid or fully in-person classes. The color-coded guidance is meant to help county school districts navigate reopening schools and conducting activities as the pandemic continues during the school year.

The guidance has been in the yellow tier since Jan. 21.

Sonia Jordan, the health department’s director of informatics, said the school guidance would remain the same despite the county’s 14-day positivity rate decreasing slightly to 2.0% from 2.2% last week.

Jordan also noted the number of active cases has fallen by 151 in the past week, dropping from 763 to 612. In the past three weeks, the number of cases has dropped significantly, as the county had a total of 1,200 on Jan. 14. Additionally, according to the health department’s data, the average number of new cases dropped from 32 cases last week to 27 cases this week.

photo by: Lawrence-Douglas County Public Health

Douglas County’s 14-day average of new COVID-19 cases for Feb. 4, 2021

photo by: Lawrence-Douglas County Public Health

Douglas County’s 14-day COVID-19 positivity rate for Feb. 4, 2021.

Locally the positivity rates have improved as well, as Lawrence’s rate fell slightly to 1.8%, Baldwin City’ fell to 3.7%, and Eudora’s fell to 5.9%. However, Lecompton’s rate increased to 4.3%.

Using its own gating criteria, the improving virus data did not make much a change for the Lawrence school district. The district’s system collects data for five criteria related to the spread of the virus in the community and school district. That data is then put into a weighted system — giving some criteria more importance than others — to come up with an average rating, which then provides a learning method recommendation.

The district’s system provided a 1.9 average score on Thursday, which is the same score it produced the last two weeks, keeping the district’s guidance in its yellow tier. The yellow tier calls for sixth grade and up to use hybrid, while pre-K to fifth grade uses hybrid or fully in-person learning.

The district announced through social media that it would continue to use its hybrid learning model for another two weeks and will provide another update on Feb. 18.

The Lawrence guidance can be found on its website, usd497.org.

The health department’s school guidance can be found on its website, ldchealth.org/457/Smart-and-Safe-School-Reopening. Both are updated on Thursdays.