AUSTIN, Texas — Austin Independent School District leaders addressed employee concerns after more than a thousand staff members were denied medical accommodations to work from home in the Spring semester.
KVUE previously reported that, of the 1,156 total medical accommodations requests received from teachers for the spring 2021 semester, Austin ISD approved 49. For comparison, more than 1,200 of those requests were approved during the Fall semester.
During Tuesday evening's Board of Trustees meeting, Superintendent Stephanie Elizalde laid out the guidelines they used to make each decision on a case-by-case basis.
This included looking at who are considered high-risk individuals, if someone can work remotely effectively, and if the individual serves a large number of students or a special group of people.
"Simply having legal documentation saying you are at risk does not qualify you from working from home," said Elizalde.
The district consulted the American Disabilities Act, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Austin Public Health in making some of these health related determinations.
Some members of the Austin ISD community called into Tuesday's meeting to express their concerns.
"If employees are not taken care of, students are not being taken care of," said Jared Brackenridge, an Austinite concerned about these plans.
"I don't know how you think that it's acceptable to have no teacher in the classroom and how that is better than having a teacher teaching from home," said a substitute teacher with Austin ISD.
If a staff member was denied accommodations, staff can also request other alternatives like higher-grade protective equipment or structure changes to their work spaces to increase safety.
The district also announced the results of the COVID-19 drive-thru rapid testing during Tuesday's meeting.
Of the 1,790 students, staff and families that took part in the rapid testing, 43 of those tests came back positive. Thirty-four positive tests were members of Austin ISD, including four individuals enrolled virtually.
For more information on Tuesday's meeting, visit the district's website.
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