Definitely. Our kid’s class had repeated outbreaks last year and the school struggled to achieve that balance.
Their hands were also somewhat tied by a district policy that prohibits screening the whole class for lice, which I think is intended to prevent placing a stigma on anyone, but from my perspective seems like a really dumb policy since they still have a policy of sending kids home if they’re found to have lice (and requiring the kids pass a screening to come back). So there were a couple of kids who just kept getting sent home over and over, and they weren’t actually identifying the kid(s) who were spreading it in the class.
Eventually a couple of resourceful parents persuaded the principal to override that policy and allow a team of screeners to come do a quick check on everyone. They found a couple kids who hadn’t previously been found, and the problem went away. But the whole thing had to be done quietly to avoid getting the principal in trouble. Sigh.
