Canberra students will return to school next week with rapid antigen tests to be distributed to families with the bulk of the tests to be available by the end of week one.
The ACT government's highly anticipated return to school plan will include surveillance testing but schools will not be entirely reliant on testing and it will not be compulsory.
The ACT's plan will follow that of NSW and Victoria with two tests a week provided to every student and school staff member across the first four weeks of Term 1.
Schools will follow many of the other COVID-safe measures that were implemented at the end of last year, including improved ventilation, reduced mixing of children in different cohorts and staggered break times.
Students will also no longer necessarily be considered close contacts if there is a positive case in their class.
The first lot of rapid antigen tests - about 206,000 - will be delivered to schools by the end of next week and individual schools will be responsible for distributing the tests to parents via contactless collection points.
While not all of the tests will be distributed in the first days of school, Education Minister Yvette Berry said there were other measures in place to keep students and staff safe.
She pointed to priority booster shots for teachers, which has been rolled out over the past weeks.
Ms Berry said teachers and students could access tests at testing centres next week.
"We are attempting to as soon as possible get as many of those rapid indigent tests out to our school communities before the end of next week," she said.
"Rapid antigen tests are another tool in our toolkit if you like to make sure that we have as many measures in place to keep our schools safe, and to reduce the transmission of COVID in our schools."
Issues with rapid antigen test supplies have plagued the territory over recent weeks but Chief Minister Andrew Barr said the territory had received extra stock in the past days.
Mr Barr said there were 160,000 tests delivered last Friday and there were 200,000 expected on Monday.
He said by the end of the week an extra 300,000 tests were due to arrive. About 2.5 million are expected over February.
"I think the worst of the supply shortages are behind the nation and access to them and delivery timetables are getting a little bit easier," Mr Barr said.
"It will be a hell of a lot easier in a month ... we're well placed now, we've got the orders that we were anticipating and the diversification of supply lines has worked in our favour."
The rapid antigen tests won't be compulsory and the ACT government will rely on goodwill that parents won't send children to school if they are sickl.
"We believe that this is an important toolkit as we respond to COVID-19 and the Omicron variant," Ms Berry said.
"I want to make it clear that it is not compulsory for children to take the rapid antigen tests."
"I think we can be fairly confident with the ACT's community response, as far as asking them to make sure they do the right thing and to test their child if they have symptoms or not send their child to school if they are unwell."
As tests are not compulsory, parents will not have to log negative results. If a child tests positive the result will need to be logged with ACT Health.
Teachers will not be required to undertake any rapid antigen tests on students. If a student at school has symptoms Ms Berry said they will be confined to sick bay areas at school until a parent can take them home.
Ms Berry said schools would have a leading role in making their communities safe against widespread transmission but that authorities felt tranmission was more likely to occur outside of school communities.
"Each school is unique. Each school has a different physical layout and each school principal knows their school more intimately than anybody else dose," she said.
"We're working with all of those stakeholders to make sure that should the circumstance arrive where we need to make adjustments in our schools, face-to-face or on-campus learning, we'll make sure we'll do it in a way that parents can be assured the information they receive is as clear as possible."
There will be enough tests distributed to allow for two tests a week for all students and staff across the first four weeks of term.
Teachers and students in year 7 and above will be required to wear masks and mask wearing will be strongly encouraged for students in years 3 to 6. Unlike NSW, cloth masks will be allowed.
