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CAPE FEAR MEMORIAL BRIDGE: Updates, resources, and context

New Hanover County Schools reactivates Covid-19 dashboard

Until June of this year, NHCS managed an online dashboard showing school-specific Covid-19 data. Then, it stopped.
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NHCS
Until June of this year, NHCS managed an online dashboard showing school-specific Covid-19 data. Then, it stopped.

Over the summer the district deactivated the dashboard, deferring to the county — but parents pushed back, having come to rely on the school-specific data during the pandemic.

The reactivated dashboard — which can be found here — shows new the weekly total of Covid-19 cases, quarantines, and clusters for each school. It will be updated every Friday. (Last week's grand totals were 175 new cases, 125 quarantines, and no clusters.)

That's the kind of granular data that isn't provided by the county's health department (and what's led other school districts, like Brunswick, Wake, and Charlotte-Mecklenburg, to maintain their own school-specific Covid dashboards).

Related: NHCS discontinues school-by-school Covid-19 dashboard, citing unreliable and 'suboptimal' data

Last month, an NHCS spokesperson told WHQR the dashboard had been pulled because it was a drain on staff resources and wasn't delivering consistently reliable data. The district said some of the change stemmed from updated guidance in the Strong Schools Toolkit and consultation with the county health department.

After WHQR initially reported on the issue, NHCS followed up to say it would be hiring an administrative support position in the communications department to help reactivate the dashboard. There was no timeline given at the time — but one week later is, it's fair to say, a pretty good turnaround.