New recommendations for school re-opening, developed jointly by the PA Department of Health (PDH) and the PA Department of Education (PDE), rely on two standard metrics used by public health experts. Those metrics are incidence rate per 100,000 people and the percent positivity of diagnostic testing in a specified county. The new recommendations are for school districts to use when deciding which instructional model to implement in response to changing levels of COVID-19 transmission in their respective counties. The metrics for every county are available on the PDH COVID-19 Early Warning Monitoring System Dashboard or by clicking here.
Recommendations are as follows:.

• Low Risk – In-person or blended/hybrid instruction is advised in counties with less than 10 cases per 100,000 residents and less than 5% positivity rate in the last seven (7) days.
• Medium Risk – Blended or remote instruction is recommended in counties with more than 10 but less than 100 cases per 100,000 residents or between 5 and 10% positivity rate.
• Substantial Risk – Full remote instruction is recommended in counties with more than 100 cases per 100,000 residents or more than a 10% positivity rate, and that is when full remote instruction is recommended.

PDH and PDE have stated that, since the threshold may change from week to week, they recommend schools consider changing their learning models after observing two consecutive weeks of the same designation. This information courtesy of The Sentinel and can be accessed in its entirety by clicking here.