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Bullis SchoolK-12 Private Co-Ed College Preparatory Day School

Head of School Community Update: December 15, 2021

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Head of School Community Update: December 15, 2021

Dear Bullis Families,

Bullis Community Update from Head of School, Christian Sullivan

As you may have seen on the news media, several local schools and districts have decided to teach remotely until the beginning of their winter holidays. We will be in school as normal on Thursday and Friday; we can all begin to enjoy a much-deserved break on Friday evening.

On Monday, we carried out 629 tests and received 2 positive results. Tomorrow, we will test the rest of our community. Since Thanksgiving, we have had a total of 4 positive results, including the two on Monday. Any change to our plan is not justified by these results. Contract tracing has found no indication of on-campus transmission, but out of an abundance of caution, we are testing all the students in the grades where positive cases were found on Monday. To date, since the start of school, we have carried out 15,258 tests and had 19 positive results for a test positivity rate of 0.12%

School will restart as planned on Tuesday, January 4th. Upon this return, we have decided to institute an additional testing regime. As well as all faculty and students being required to be tested on Tuesday, January 4th, we will also require everyone to be tested again on Thursday, January 6th. We are doing this in order to try to capture in the test results anyone who became infected with COVID at the very end of the vacation, but who did not present as positive in the Tuesday testing results. We will also test everyone the following week…and so on!

Frankly, I am not optimistic about community spread in January. Testing is the prime method for us to quarantine positive people away from the campus and keep everyone safe. This, along with all your efforts to stay safe, I hope and believe will prevent us from having to teach remotely at all during this academic year. Please, please help us by masking, getting vaccinated, avoiding close contacts, and getting your booster shots.

I will write again towards the end of the week with more joyful content.

Warmly,

christian sullivan signature

Christian G. Sullivan
Head of School