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Updates to Ontario’s COVID-19 School and Child Care Screening Tool

As the 2021-22 school year continues, Ontario has made updates to its COVID-19 school and child care screening tool. The province will continue to update the screening tool as public health guidance evolves and any changes will be communicated to the HWDSB community.

Updates to the screening tools include:

• Symptoms – Clarifying that staff, students and children should stay home from school and child care if they are unwell, even if they do not have symptoms that are most commonly associated with COVID-19, and monitor before returning to school.

• Testing – Clarifying that rapid antigen tests are not for use on individuals with symptoms of COVID-19 or on high-risk close contacts.

• Vaccination and Immunization Status – Revisions were made to the structure of the vaccination status and COVID-19 case history question to clarify that the individual could be vaccinated or had previously tested positive within the last 90 days.

• Personal Health Information and Immunization Status – Clarifying that the purpose of asking if an individual is fully vaccinated or was previously positive with COVID-19 in the past 90 days is for providing correct isolation requirements. A reminder has been added to note that no public health information is being collected when individuals complete the screening tool.

• International Travel – The international travel question has been revised to provide better clarity about who can and cannot attend school after travelling. While unvaccinated children under the age of 12 are exempt from federal quarantine if they travelled in the company of someone who qualified for an exemption from quarantine based on vaccination status, they may not attend school or child care for 14 days upon their return. Individuals with all other quarantine exemptions (e.g., travelling for cross-border custody arrangements; travelling for medical treatment) may continue to attend school or child care.

The Federal Government has included this direction regarding international travel on this web page for returning travelers.

Copies of the new screener are available for download. Similar to the 2020-21 school year, the downloadable screening tool will be made available in multiple languages. These additional languages will be added online shortly.