TAMPA, Fla. — Hillsborough County Public Schools released a dashboard reporting COVID-19 cases in schools.
The district released the new dashboard on Monday. The database contains COVID-19 cases among students and teachers. Users may select a date and view which schools reported COVID-19 cases.
Stephanie Baxter-Jenkins is the Executive Director for Hillsborough Classroom Teachers Association (HCTA), a local labor union representing teachers and educational support personnel with the Hillsborough County School District.
She believes the database is helpful for parents.
"This is nice because you can tell if your child's school had an issue come up and you can tell were a number of people impacted or just one person," said Baxter-Jenkins.
The information on the database shows the total number of reported cases in Hillsborough County Public Schools since July 31, when teachers reported back to work.
The COVID-19 Data Dashboard will be updated automatically every two hours from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
"In terms of the data, I'm glad to see we're going to be transparent about letting parents know what's going on at our schools," said Baxter-Jenkins.
Several other school districts like Pasco and Polk are also releasing the number of COVID-19 cases in schools.
“Our priority is ensuring transparency as our learners head back to school next week. Each school is prepared with stockpiles of PPE, safety measures throughout our campuses, and protocols when a positive COVID-19 case is reported. We will send communications to families when a positive case impacts their school. This data dashboard will be another tool to provide the most up to date information to our entire community,” said Addison Davis, Hillsborough County Public Schools Superintendent.
The Florida Department of Health is not releasing COVID-19 cases in schools.
A spokesperson said in a statement, "The Department of Health is continuing to review and determine the most appropriate method for reporting outbreaks in schools. However, case and testing information related to schools will be incorporated into daily statewide and county reporting as well as the Department's COVID-19 Data and Surveillance Dashboard."
You can click here to access the school district's dashboard.
