University of Oregon to offer free COVID testing for K-12 schools this fall with federal funding

The University of Oregon's COVID-19 testing program will be extending to K-12 schools across Lane County and Southwest Oregon this school year, offering free weekly tests to schools and students that participate. 

UO’s Monitoring and Assessment Program (also known as MAP) has been offering free testing for the virus since last year, giving UO students and employees the chance to test for free in the fall and then opening it up to the whole community at the beginning of 2021.

It's administered more than 90,000 tests and now, with the promise of federal financial support, it's extending a partnership to K-12 schools. 

"We all want (the pandemic) to be over with," said Brian Fox, director of the program. "But as a major research university, we have capabilities that we can bring to bear, to serve the state, serve our families and communities, and so we feel it's really our obligation — because we have this capacity to deploy it in ways that help keep our schools open and hopefully our community safe."

In March, President Joe Biden announced $12.25 billion to go toward more COVID-19 testing for schools and to close inequity gaps and have more testing available to historically underserved groups. 

Fox said UO got a letter of intent on Aug. 5 from the Oregon Health Authority that the MAP program would receive $17.1 million through the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services grant to offer free testing to students in Lane, Douglas, Coos, Curry, Josephine and Jackson counties.

It works like this: Public and private K-12 schools in these counties can sign up to participate in the program. From there, the schools will notify students and families, who will then choose to opt in to the free weekly testing service.

Students are sent home with a bag that will include a vial for collecting the children's saliva, funnel, alcohol wipe and instructions for use. 

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The program then will work with schools to find a day each week to collect samples, and send them back to UO's lab.

"In some areas, we'll have couriers that pick them up and bring them back to our processing facility in Eugene," Fox said. "In some places, we're working with FedEx to be able to manage those logistics and pick them up from schools." 

Even though it hasn't signed an official contract with the state yet, UO has started purchasing supplies and getting ready to roll out this new K-12 program as soon as possible, with the understanding these costs will be reimbursed by the state.

Fox said they didn't want to wait to start preparations.

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"We're working really hard to have this operational by the start of school," he said. "We expect that there will be some (districts) where we've had enough lead time to be fully operational for them. We expect more schools will be signing up as the school year starts, and for this to really ramp up over the next several weeks."

UO also is preparing for the likely increase of testing demand when college students return to campus, and are hiring for more people to work the program so they can manage both testing needs at both levels, Fox said.

"This is one tool among many, and I think that's important," he said. "It's not a silver bullet — there really aren't silver bullets. It's about creating layers of tools that schools can use to help keep the students safe or community safe, and reduce the incidents and spread."

Contact reporter Jordyn Brown at jbrown@registerguard.com or 541-246-4264, and follow her on Twitter @thejordynbrown and Instagram @registerguard. Support local journalism, subscribe to The Register-Guard.