With COVID-19 cases rising, Grapevine-Colleyville ISD cancels football games, warns of school closures

Amid rising COVID-19 cases, Grapevine-Colleyville ISD Superintendent Robin Ryan is urging families to practice COVID-19 safety and avoid gatherings where masks aren’t required.

The district has reported 47 lab-confirmed cases of the virus in the last week. As a result, 377 people have been deemed close-contacts and have been required to self-quarantine for a minimum of 14 days, according to an email from Ryan.

If cases continue to increase, individual school campuses may be closed, Ryan said in the email. At the beginning of the year, the district had said that teachers and staff would be prepared to transition back to remote learning if necessarily.

The infections are not only impacting learning, Colleyville Heritage High School’s varsity and junior varsity games have been cancelled for the next two weeks because of the number of student-athletes and staff currently quarantining. This includes the school’s homecoming game. The district said homecoming festivities will be postponed until Dec. 4, to take place during the game against Mansfield Legacy.

Colleyville Heritage High School’s freshman football games will continue as planned.

In cases of lab-confirmed COVID-19, GCISD utilizes contact tracing to notify those who have potentially been exposed and give them instructions on quarantining. Through this data, the district said they have determined the majority of case outbreaks come from events held outside of school that haven’t enforced mask-wearing or social distancing.

The district has seen a total of 136 lab-confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the last 30 days. Since Nov. 5, the number of lab-confirmed cases has increased by 50.

The district updates their online COVID-19 tracker with lab-confirmed cases daily. Cases are kept for 30 days before they are rolled off. For more information about COVID-19 safety protocols, visit the district’s website.