Temperature checks have become a regular part of the COVID-19 protocol but in Morris County, one school district is taking their coronavirus precautions even more seriously, requiring students and staff to wear armbands that display their body temperature.
Butler School District
The Butler School District will be requiring students and staff to wear Bluetooth enabled armbands, made by Accwell, which attach to the upper arm via an adjustable Velcro strap. The armbands will be in addition to other precautions including no-contact thermometers that school nurses will use to track the health of the Butler school community.
Information about the armbands is detailed in the Butler School District’s 2020-2021 School Restart and Recovery Plan.
“Butler School District has worked with Accwell to purchase armbands that all students and staff will wear daily while on the premises,” reads the plan. “Armbands will provide daily temperature readings. Armbands will provide daily reports to our nurses to track wellness within our school district. Students and staff will be responsible for charging their armbands daily and wearing them to school – students who do not have their armbands will not be permitted into their classrooms. The Butler School District will provide the armbands – in the instance of loss or breakage, families will be responsible for replacement and students will need to remain out of the building until a replacement is in place.”
“I think it was an outside the box way to solve a problem that a lot of schools are struggling with,” Superintendent Dr. Dan Johnson told ABC News 7. “The device is an armband, very similar to Fitbit. It uses very low-level technology that is able to give a temperature read of students while they’re in the building.”
While the cost of purchasing a lost or broken armband was not revealed in the plan, parents will certainly be sure to impress upon their kids to keep the armbands safe and on their person at all times.
If the measures to keep students and staff safe sound extreme it may be due to the fact that since schools have started to reopen across the country cases of COVID among children have increased. One report stated that in the last two weeks of July, 97,000 students tested positive for the virus.
It’s expected that Gov. Phil Murphy will announce today that schools will have the option to start the school year with no in-person classes. School districts will have to show why they cannot operate in-person for this to be allowed.
It remains to be seen if special measures like armbands will help to mitigate the risk of COVID at New Jersey schools. For the most up-to-date info on kids and COVID click here.
