With students from both the public and private school systems across the island testing positive for the COVID-19 virus, KUAM News stopped by a couple private schools to see what measures are in place to prevent the spread of the virus.

As of Friday, The Guam Department of Education has reported that 30 students have tested positive for the Coronavirus since the start of the school year. The Archdiocese of Agana has also reported that seven students have contracted the virus.

First, we caught up with Harvest Christian Academy in Mongmong-Toto-Maite which educates 935 students from kindergarten to the twelfth grade. Pastor Jeremy Zajicek, School Administrator for Harvest Christian Academy explains to KUAM News the layered COVID mitigation strategy.

Zajicek told KUAM News, "That includes everything from your first experience entering into our campus making sure that you know we restrict outside issues coming into campus. From there, we have cohorts in our classrooms that make sures that if there are any issues we can do appropriate contact tracing to notify parents accordingly. There's things in the classroom of course wearing a mask, of course following the governor's mask mandate. There is also HEPA Air filtration systems in the classrooms, plexiglass at each desk, kids travel how they line up, it's' really kind of change the world of education and were doing our best to make sure that we follow all those protocols and not just keep our students safe but educate them in one of the best environments which is the face-to-face education."

There is no vaccine mandate for faculty, staff and eligible students however it is highly recommended to those who choose to not get the vaccine.

Meanwhile, over at Saint Anthony Catholic School, a mask mandate, sanitization, and temperature checks are also some of the COVID safety measures.

St. Anthony Catholic School Principal Robert Crisostomo explains their COVID-19 safety manual.

He said, "One of the big things here at St. Anthony, we try to keep the bubble integrity. So the kids are in the classroom and when we have to do contact tracing it is easy for school nurse Krystal Takai to know where the student has been."

"In the classrooms we have two air filters, santization equipment like PPE's, desk shields, and UV lights that we purchased that go on at night. So we have layers of protection and the kids do use the mask. The only time they take the mask off is during lunch and lunch is consumed in the classroom. So the teachers move around as one of the protocols for maintaining and containing the spread of the virus."

As of Friday, 99% of St. Anthony personnel are fully vaccinated against the virus.