The principal of a private Catholic high school tested positive for COVID-19 days after participating in a graduation ceremony at Homestead-Miami Speedway on Saturday, school officials said.
Christopher Columbus High School Principal David Pugh tested positive for the coronavirus on Wednesday, spokeswoman Cristina Cruz told the Miami Herald. She said Pugh's symptoms, including a “very mild fever" began Saturday evening following the event.
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Pugh was tested on Sunday and received results on Wednesday, she said.
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The school has been conducting temperature checks for everyone on campus, including Pugh, whose last temperature check was Friday, Cruz said.
“Although he does not have any symptoms now, he may have had the virus on Saturday during the graduation ceremony at the raceway,” Cruz told the Herald in an email.
Cruz said school employees were sent home and anyone who came into contact with Pugh is being asked to quarantine for 14 days, and to get tested.
The all-boys high school hosted graduation at the racetrack as a way of providing 2020 graduates with an in-person but socially distanced ceremony. Graduates stayed in their cars during the ceremony, and pulled up to a tent to receive diplomas through the car window.
Pugh was among the administrators handing diplomas to graduates, Cruz said.
The school was closed on Wednesday and will be sanitized over the next few days before reopening on Monday, Cruz said.
