Laura Gama, a parent of an eleventh-grader, joins a rally opposing LAUSD’s student vaccine mandate outside the district office in Los Angeles while the school board meets on enforcement of the mandate on Dec. 14, 2021. (Sarah Reingewirtz, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG/TNS)
(Tribune News Service) — Two years ago, the L.A. Unified School District set a high bar for COVID safety, telling employees: Get vaccinated or lose your job. That vaccine mandate — which achieved a 99% compliance rate among teachers — ended Tuesday following a 6-1 vote by the Board of Education.
The nation’s second-largest school system — widely viewed as a national pacesetter in strong COVID-19 safety measures early in the pandemic emergency — had been among the last public school systems to continue a mandate. LAUSD, however, has been under pressure to change course because of ongoing litigation. Officials stressed that their actions were based on evolving science. And no one made any apologies.
“Yes, this board approved, required vaccinations, as a means of reducing transmission, reducing the severity of a disease that in this community, across this country and across the world killed millions,” L.A. Unified Supt. Alberto Carvalho said. “This was a necessary requirement, and it was adopted so that schools could reopen safely based on information that was known, then accepted, then verified, then validated ... not by speculation, but by scientists.”
“In 2023,” he added, “we face vastly different circumstances.”
Carvalho and others noted that the coronavirus has become endemic — it’s not going to go away — and also said that the need for a vaccine requirement is outdated due to evolving understanding about the virus, the successes and limitations of vaccines and the availability of therapeutics.
Board member George McKenna voted to preserve the requirement, saying it had saved lives and lessened the severity of the illness — and that it probably would still do so.
The district on Tuesday did not provide the number of employees who declined to be vaccinated or lost jobs. Hundreds of unvaccinated teachers were initially accommodated by allowing them to transfer to online academies that were set up after most students returned to in-person instruction in the fall of 2021.
But at least 250 teachers have lost jobs since then, as optional online enrollment has steadily declined, said Mark Muskrath, an unvaccinated virtual academy teacher who has closely followed the fate of unvaccinated teachers and related litigation against the school system.
Muskrath added that an estimated 500 nonteaching workers also lost jobs — with no recourse to work at a virtual academy.
Officials said unvaccinated former employees would not automatically reclaim jobs but could be considered for open positions.
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