Governor Gavin Newsom announced on Wednesday that all of California’s teachers and school staff must get vaccinated against COVID-19 by October 15th or submit to weekly tests. The state is now the first in the nation to impose such a requirement, which received union backing.
“We think this is the right thing to do and we think this is a sustainable way to keeping our schools open and to address the number one anxiety that parents like myself have for young children,” Newsom said at a San Francisco Bay Area school.
Many California schools have already commenced the school year. The California Teachers Association, a union that represent some 310,000 educators, said nearly 90% of its membership has been vaccinated.
“Educators want to be in classrooms with their students, and the best way to make sure that happens is for everyone who is medically eligible to be vaccinated, with robust testing and multi-tiered safety measures,” said California Teachers Association President E. Toby Boyd in a statement. “Today’s announcement is an appropriate next step to ensure the safety of our school communities and to protect our youngest learners under 12 who are not yet vaccine eligible from this highly contagious Delta variant.”
The Wall Street Journal provides more context:
The new mandate comes as the Covid-19 cases caused in large part by the Delta variant have been growing all summer in California and across the nation. It mirrors a similar order that took effect last week for state employees, which didn’t apply to teachers as they work for local districts and not the state. California has also ordered that all healthcare workers be vaccinated by Sept. 30, with exceptions for those who have medical or religious reasons to decline.
While California is adopting aggressive measures to curb the pandemic, other states are headed in the opposite direction. Florida’s Republican Governor, Ron DeSantis, has threatened to withhold funding to school districts that require students to wear masks.
