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Early Wednesday morning, Wayne Ellringer walked into a classroom in Dover-Eyota's elementary school armed with a plastic jug attached to a small hose. He plugged the contraption into an

outlet and started shooting a cloud of disinfectant throughout the room, killing any lingering germs that may have made it past the cleaning wipes and hand sanitizer used throughout the

week. Now that more and more schools are transitioning to some form of in-person learning, the war on germs is gearing up. School custodians like Ellringer are on the front lines of that

war. The increased amount of cleaning is one of the reminders that just because students are back in school doesn't mean things are going to look the same way they did a year ago.

ADVERTISEMENT ALSO READ: ROCHESTER PUBLIC SCHOOLS FINDS FOOTING ON GENDER-NEUTRAL RESTROOMS Technically, the specific enemy in question is the coronavirus, but students and staff also would

seem to be at a reduced risk for catching any other bugs floating around with all the mitigation efforts in place. Jeanne Svobodny, principal of Dover-Eyota Elementary School, said the

weekly fogging of classrooms is just one of the mitigation efforts they're using to keep the risk of spreading COVID-19 as low as possible. Other measures: Students enter the building

through several doors. When they go to lunch, they all have to face the same way. The school has extended its lunch tables into part of the gym to accommodate the need for social distancing.

There are similar mitigation efforts in place throughout schools across the area. Rochester Public Schools is following the COVID-19 guidelines put forward by the The American Society of

Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers. According to the district's website, that "includes increased air exchange rates throughout the day, building

'flushing' two hours prior to occupancy and more frequent filter changes." ADVERTISEMENT In Stewartville's schools, drinking fountains and restroom hand dryers have been

turned off. Instead, the district says people can use bottle fillers and paper tower dispensers. Stewartville also is providing desktop/tabletop clear acrylic dividers for classrooms that

aren't able to keep students 6 feet apart. The Minnesota Department of Health provides some guidelines for schools to follow. For example, the department instructs school districts to

use hand sanitizer that is at least 60% alcohol and to "establish a daily schedule for routine environmental cleaning and disinfection of high-touch surfaces." That leaves some

discretion up to individual districts as to how to go about their mitigation efforts. And local officials sometimes network with each other to find best practices and share ideas. Nate

Walbruch, principal of Plainview-Elgin-Millville High School, said it helps build a sense that the district is on the right track when can look at others and realize it isn't the only

one doing something. "We really just kind of steal from each other as much as we possibly can," Walbruch said about the mitigation process. "There's the old adage of: you

never want to be the only school with a snow day, and you also don't want to be the only school that's in session when everyone else is shut. That same sort of idea kind of goes

along with everything else." Still, school districts may differ in how they go about accomplishing any given task. The Minnesota Department of Health's planning guide says that

"daily documentation of student mealtime seating is required to support contact tracing in the event of an exposure." ADVERTISEMENT Rochester Public Schools decided on a high-tech

way to accomplish that. The district is using QR codes to keep track of the thousands of students moving through the lunchroom on a given day. If students don't have personal devices

capable of scanning the code, they are able to use their school-issued devices. “The QR code shows us where they were sitting and for what duration,” said Heather Nessler, the

district's director of communications. Should a student become ill, the QR codes will show who they were near and for how long. By Jordan Shearer Jordan Shearer covers K-12 education

for the Post Bulletin. A Rochester native, he graduated from Bemidji State University in 2013 before heading out to write for a small newsroom in the boonies of western Nebraska. Bringing

things full circle, he returned to Rochester in 2020 just shy of a decade after leaving. Readers can reach Jordan at 507-285-7710 or [email protected].