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After high traffic on campus from homecoming last week, Helias Catholic High School had a "sanitization day," which the school has about once a month this year.
During sanitization days, school is out of session so the custodial staff can thoroughly sanitize high-traffic areas such as the library, weight room and general common spaces.
To allow for more social distancing, Helias switched to a longer school day this year to include eight periods. Some of those extra hours were allocated to sanitization days, Principal Kenya Fuemmeler said.
There are about eight sanitization days this school year, Fuemmeler said.
"They occur at regular intervals, but we are really cognizant of trying to build them around key high-traffic times in our building," Fuemmeler said.
For example, they decided to have a sanitization day Monday because there was more traffic on campus during homecoming week last week.
On these days, everything on campus is shut down until 3 p.m.
"When the kids and the teachers are there, sometimes you clean up one space only to have a mess again," Fuemmeler said. "We felt like this allows us to be a lot more intentional and focused to provide a cleaner school."
Other sanitation efforts at Helias this year include sanitizing lunch tables after every lunch shift and using ion cannons- also known as sanitation guns - twice a day. These devices use electrostatic technology to thoroughly sanitize surfaces. Helias also installed air ventilation systems in each classroom and common spaces.
"We want to make sure that our procedures evolve as what we learn about the virus changes, but we want to make sure that things we're doing are also potentially procedures that will keep us safe from strep and the flu and all kinds of other illnesses," Fuemmeler said.
Helias hasn't had any COVID-19 cases in the building, Communications Director Sandy Hentges said.
The Jefferson City School District's sanitation efforts include focusing on sanitizing high-touch surfaces such as handrails, desks, countertops and handles often.
In previous years, the custodial staff sanitized surfaces more in the evenings. Now, they sanitize these surfaces more often and more thoroughly during the school day.
The custodians are using the same cleaning supplies as in previous years, but they're using much more than normal, Underwood said.
"Now, there's just a heightened sense of awareness - so making sure that we get every desk, every seat bottom, every teacher's desk, handrails, even the hand sanitizing dispensers," he said.
The custodial staff also documents the time each area in each building was cleaned to ensure they're cleaned frequently.
JC Schools has had 75 COVID-19 cases, resulting in 99 close contacts. Ten of these are active cases which resulted in 17 close contacts, according to jcschools.us.
The Blair Oaks R-2 School District also added the use of sanitation guns to its cleaning procedures. Each day, custodians use these in the buildings, and the school bus staff uses them on the buses, Superintendent Jim Jones said.
Blair Oaks staff also uses Spray Nine disinfectant cleaner and special rags intended to thoroughly sanitize surfaces, Jones said.
Custodians and other employees are frequently cleaning frequently-touched surfaces throughout the buildings. They sanitize surfaces in the lunch rooms after each lunch shift, they sanitize classrooms throughout the day when students are not in them, and they have a rotation schedule throughout the day to clean bathrooms, Jones said.
"It requires hours of our staff to be utilized in those efforts, and we've been able to meet all ends to this point," Jones said. "I can't say enough about what our buildings and grounds staff has done."
Since Aug. 26, Blair Oaks has had seven COVID-19 cases, including three students and four staff members, according to blairoaks.k12.mo.us.
These cases resulted in 19 close contacts, including 15 from a staff member and four from a fourth-grade teacher who tested positive recently.
On Sunday morning, Blair Oaks was informed the fourth-grade teacher tested positive. The teacher was not at school Friday.
The Cole County Health Department determined while no students were close contacts, four staff members were. The health department also determined the teacher's exposure to the virus was not at school.