Momauguin School Has 79 In Quarantine District Case Tracker Shows

EAST HAVEN, CT — Monday, five new coronavirus cases were reported in East Haven schools and the two cases at Momauguin Elementary School, a student and a staff member, sent 79 students and teachers into quarantine, the district COVID-19 case tracker shows.

Patch has reached out to schools Superintendent Erica Forti for comment and this post will be updated should a response be received.

In addition to the high number of Momauguin school community members in quarantine, there are 26 in quarantine at East Haven High School and 34 in quarantine from Tuttle School with the middle school and East Haven Academy with quarantine numbers in the teens.

To date, there have been 67 staff members and 155 students who tested positive for COVID-19 in East Haven schools.

East Shore Health District director Michael Pascucilla told Patch early Monday that while East Haven case rates are high, they are "trending down." He said the previous case rate per 100,000 was 53 and now stands at 38 and the case positivity rate, which was at 7.7 percent is now at 6.1 percent.

Pascucilla said that as last summer East Haven chose to go full in-person, with an option for parents to have their kids learn remotely, the district has "done a good job."

Pascucilla maintains that while some nearby districts opted for hybrid learning and now are "cautiously" planning to pivot to full in-person leaning, East Haven committed to the full in-school plan and has stuck to it.

"They planned for in-person and they put all the firewalls in place," he said. "They made their decision and (Forti) and her team did a good job."

Pascucilla was responding to a question about how he recommended against a sudden shift to full in-person at Branford schools, which opted for the hybrid model and where community spread is not decreasing at the same rate as the state as a whole. Pascucilla said comparing towns isn't a useful instrument of measure as each town is different and, each made their choice of school model last summer and needs to be cautious in pivoting from one model to another.