Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp signed an executive order Monday night closing all public elementary, secondary and post-secondary public schools in Georgia from Wednesday, March 18 to Tuesday, March 31.

The Troup County Board of Education announced this past Friday it would close its doors starting Monday through March 27. The executive order signed by the governor added two school days to that move by the board.

“To keep our students, teachers, and administrators safe and mitigate the spread of COVID-19, I am ordering the closure of all public elementary, secondary, and post-secondary schools in Georgia from March 18, 2020, to March 31, 2020,” Kemp said. “This measure is critical to reducing local transmission in communities across our state, and I ask Georgians to continue to follow best practices — washing their hands regularly, isolating the elderly and chronically ill, and avoiding large events if possible — in the days and weeks ahead.”

TCSS Superintendent Brian Shumate, who learned of the information after the school system’s work session, said that he’d bring the information to the board Thursday and see how they wanted to handle coming back to a school on a Wednesday.

“We didn’t have this information during the board meeting that just ended 30 minutes ago,” Shumate said. “But certainly, we will have that discussion with the board and act on it Thursday night.”

The school system is scheduled to have a business meeting at 5:30 p.m. Thursday. On Monday, Shumate announced the meeting would be a virtual meeting to practice social distancing due to COVID-19. The school system has not announced how it will present the meeting to the public.