Testing every school in America.

Testing an entire classroom usually takes about 10-15 minutes and speeds up after the first day. The students become pros at picking swabbing their nose.

In our experience, not only can kindergarteners perform their own swabs, they often do the best of all the grades. Our test can be used by any grade, K through 12.

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We’re here for you! The first thing we do with new customers is provide them with comprehensive instructions explaining how to set up and run a testing program. We provide you with all the information you need to make sure everything runs smoothly. As of March 2021, we’ve provided our pooled testing service to 800 schools; we’ve learned a lot about what schools need and are constantly improving our service to better serve you.

Pooling dramatically reduces the cost of testing without sacrificing accuracy. If the pooled test result is negative, it’s unlikely anyone is infected and students continue learning uninterrupted. If the pool result is positive, someone in the classroom is most likely sick; you can then follow up to stop an outbreak—for just the cost of one test.

When a positive pooled test result occurs, a pod can use diagnostic tests to help confirm who is sick. The decision to do follow-up testing is up to each school. A common next step is to provide individual testing for students in the positive pool.

All students in a class, pod, or cohort swab their own noses and place their samples in a single tube (that’s the pooling step). The samples in that tube are then run as a single sample, using one test. See it in action here.

If students have trouble performing the swabbing, schools can provide a nurse or other trained staff member to help. However, the test is so easy that kindergarteners typically can do it with no issues.

The CDC recommends that schools in areas with moderate community spread test at least once a week. For areas with higher rates of community spread, the CDC suggests considering testing twice a week.

You know the old saying: “knowledge is power.” Tools like pooled testing empower you to make great decisions. Without knowing the specific prevalence of COVID-19 in your classrooms, it’s tough to make informed decisions about safeguarding your community, returning to school, or continuing in-person learning.

No. Since pooled tests do not provide results for individuals, the results are not reported to public health authorities. We only share the results of pooled tests with the individuals that you tell us to.

One pool combines samples from 5 to 25 people. Each pooled test is $150, which breaks down to $6 per person for a pool of 25. (Psst! You could be eligible for government funding! Speak to our team to learn more.)There are different regulations for tests that provide individual results and tests that provide “population-level” results—that is, results for groups of people. Tests that do not give individual results, like our pooled test, do not require FDA authorization. For more information on how different types of tests are regulated, visit this CDC webpage to learn more.

Each pool consists of samples from 5 to 25 people.

Molecular tests, which detect the genetic code of the virus, are typically highly accurate at detecting the virus that causes COVID-19. Click here to read our validation reports for our lab at Ginkgo and our partner labs across the country. Fair warning: the information is a bit dense!

Our pooled test uses short nasal swabs that go just a half inch into the nostril; think: cotton swabs. We do not use the long “brain tickler” swabs for our pooled test. We like to say, “if you can pick your nose, you can take this test!”

We offer a pooled test that can test 25 people using one test. Our pooled test works by detecting the genetic code of the virus that causes COVID-19. These tests are sometimes known as “molecular tests” or “PCR tests.” 

For individual diagnostic testing, we offer rapid antigen and PCR tests. Both of these types of tests can be used as a follow up to pooled testing, to help pinpoint infections.