A Brooklyn school where roughly 150 students and staff crowded into a cafeteria last week for lunch has turned up no positive COVID-19 cases after health officials tested everyone in the building Monday, Education Department officials confirmed.
Staffers at the Connie Lekas school for students with complex disabilities in Sheepshead Bay were furious over last week’s cafeteria gathering, which left adults and mostly maskless students, including some with chronic medical conditions, in close contact while kids ate, according to staff accounts.
After complaints from staff and teachers union officials and coverage from the Daily News, the Education Department sent health officials to the school Monday to perform COVID-19 tests on 36 students and 118 staffers. None came back positive, a DOE spokesman confirmed.
“We’re very happy,” said United Federation of Teachers representative Ilyana Frias. “It’s going to obviously relieve some anxiety from our families and our staff in the building.”
Frias added that staff members are still reeling from the COVID-19-related death of a dietitian who worked in the building several months ago.
Principal Antoinette Rose, who staffers say issued the cafeteria directive because she wanted to serve students hot lunches, is under investigation by the agency’s Special Commissioner of Investigation for flouting COVID-19 safety protocols, according to the Education Department.
Frias said several high-ranking Education Department officials, including the agency’s chief of special education, showed up at the building Monday. “It was music to all of our ears … that there will be accountability,” she said.
Lunches are being served in individual classrooms again, Frias said.
Principals union chief Mark Cannizzaro echoed the relief over the test results. “Any public allegations made against an educator should be appropriately investigated, but they also must be afforded due process,” he said.
“School leaders have taken on the immense duty of keeping their buildings safe, and social-distancing protocols are a responsibility shared by all members of school communities, particularly those interacting directly with students,” he explained. Rose is working remotely this year, staff told The News.
Cannizzaro added that there’s “a lack of clarity in DOE guidance around hot lunches. As a result, we have insisted the DOE promptly provide clearer guidance to all schools.”
Education Department spokesman Nathaniel Styer said, “we have provided clear, consistent guidance since September to school leaders clearly noting that cafeterias should not be used for meal service in most circumstances, and, if they must be used, all social distancing and safety measures must be followed. We will be reminding school leaders and reissuing guidance to ensure this allegation is not repeated in any school.”
