While some area school districts are battling flu outbreaks and fears of the H1N1 strain, students in the Geneseo district are facing other ailments.

“What’s caught us more right now are upper respiratory illnesses—coughs, severe colds and cases of pneumonia,” said Geneseo superintendent Scott Kuffel.

Though the district has seen a slight spike in the number of students absent in the past few weeks, the numbers aren’t much higher than normal for this time of year.

“This is actually a popular time to have students absent.We just finished the first nine weeks, so a lot of students were burning themidnight oil at that time, and this bizarre weather has been affecting students as well,” said Kuffel.

“It’s not uncommon to have 35 to 40 kids out from the high school on a normal day, and lately we’ve been more at 55 to 60,” he said.

At the elementary level, the number of students missing school due to illness has
varied depending upon the classroom.

“We have certain classes where we might have 12 or 13 students out, but other classes have 100 percent attendance,” he said. “I think parents are a little more cautious about illness now, and are more apt to keep students home.”

School staff members are doing what they can to keep students healthy. “We have four times the amount of hand sanitizer in the buildings, and, especially in the elementary schools, they’re trying to enforce more hand washing, and they’re telling kids to keep their hands out of
their mouth and eyes,” Kuffel said.

“We’ve also tried to send out the message that if your child has a fever, they must be free of that for 24 hours without medication before coming back to school,” he said. “Our community is very
good about knowing when to keep children home if they’re sick.”

As winter approaches, Kuffel said he knows the district will have its cases of the flu.

“We knowwe’ll have our run of flu— whether it’sH1N1 or another type of flu. We have that every year,” he said.

School district staff members are offered flu vaccines on an annual basis, and
Kuffel said about 130 staff members opted for a flu shot this year.