Yesterday, during a press conference Onondaga County Executive Ryan McMahon announced that Onondaga County will be shutting down all schools after Friday, March 20th in response to COVID-19. Schools are expected to remain closed through April 14th. However, if a positive case of COVID-19 is found in Onondaga County before then, all schools will shut down by Wednesday, March 18th. “I fully support this decision,” Syracuse Mayor Ben Walsh said. “This gives us time to plan and prepare.”

Last week many local private schools, including Manlius Pebble Hill and the Syracuse Hebrew Day School shut their doors in an effort to mitigate the spread of the virus. Various local public schools, including Fayetteville-Manlius, Skaneateles, and Jordan-Elbridge have already closed their doors, and will start online schooling this Monday, March 16th. 

“…Onondaga County will be shutting down all schools after Friday, March 20th in response to COVID-19.”

New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo stated that New York had no plans to close schools statewide, instead leaving local districts to decide their own plans. This is due in part to the fact that New York City has the nation’s largest public school system with approximately 1.1 million students. Additionally, 70% of these students come from low income families, and rely on schools for food, laundry services, and medical care.

In the meantime, all school related sports, extracurriculars, and field trips across Onondaga County have been canceled till after the mandatory school shutdown is over.

For more information regarding COVID-19 please refer to:

CDC: Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)

World Health Organization: Coronavirus

Johns Hopkins Live Map: Coronavirus COVID-19 (2019-nCoV)

health.ny.gov: Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19)

syracuse.com: Post-Standard

Central New York School Closures: List of CNY schools closing due to coronavirus