SANDY, Utah — The Canyons School District in Salt Lake County announced an emergency remote learning day next week amid worsening staff shortages and rising COVID-19 cases.
School is already out for a "no-student" day in the district this Friday, as well as the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday on Monday.
The new emergency remote day will be next Tuesday, and students will return to in-person instruction the next day (Wednesday, Jan. 19).
Schools will use the 5-day break for deep cleaning and to host another vaccine clinic for employees to get their booster shots. The district also approved two additional remote learning days in addition to the ones already established throughout the remainder of the school year.
The Canyons Board of Education OK'd a change in the calendar to add remote-learning days. This is in response to the spike in COVID-19 cases, which has led to operational challenges. See more, including the dates of the new Remote-Learning Days, at https://t.co/pE9hA3o4uN
— Canyons District (@canyonsdistrict) January 12, 2022
“We’re hoping the timing of this reset, falling as it does on a holiday weekend, will help disrupt transmission of the virus, while keeping the disruption to family schedules at a minimum. But we need the community’s help in strictly following the health safety measures that have been recommended by health authorities,” Superintendent Rick Robins said. “In talking with health officials, it has become clear that with the infectiousness of omicron, we have to do something different. We can no longer rely on testing our way out of this.”
More information on this announcement can be found on the district's website.