Confusion reigns as Houston schools make last-minute changes to COVID plans amid omicron wave

The night before nearly 200,000 students returned to class from winter break and fewer than 10 days after testing positive for COVID-19, Franklin Bynum’s daughter remained in isolation and he was not clear what Houston ISD expected him or the fifth grader to do. He opted to heed a doctor’s suggestion to keep her home for 10 days. The lack of communication from HISD during the time off in which the omicron variant of COVID-19 surged to new levels of contagion in the region struck Bynum as odd, he said, considering the barrage of information he usually receives from the district — recorded phone messages, emails and texts — about other matters, such as an alleged viral threat the day before break.

“I just could not believe that there was no robocall. … What do you do when your kid has COVID?” Bynum said. “You got to blast that information. It was not immediately apparent to me Sunday night.” Confusion has accompanied many students resuming instruction in Houston-area schools this week amid the latest surge in COVID cases. A review of districts’ safety plans showed many were revised in the days before kids returned to classrooms, but remained a patchwork of policies across the region. At least 11 districts — Aldine, Alief, Alvin, Friendswood, Houston, Klein, Pasadena, Santa Fe, Sheldon and Spring Branch ISDs and Stafford MSD — changed their plans to match new recommendations from federal health officials to isolate infected individuals for five days, instead of the previously suggested 10. It appeared only one district, Channelview ISD, had implemented a mask mandate due to the deluge of cases. Aldine, Spring and Houston ISDs kept their face-covering requirements in place. Most of the other districts’ stances on masks stayed the same, varying from “highly recommend” to an expectation to “respect the choice of others regarding the wearing of masks.”