How Will WA Vaccinate Teachers? Superintendent Gets Ready

OLYMPIA, WA — Washington's teachers and school staff aren't yet eligible to receive the COVID-19 vaccine, but school leaders want to be ready to get them vaccinated quickly when they are.

Chris Reykdal, Washington's superintendent of public instruction, announced Friday the new "Get Ready" program, which he said will help vaccinate as many school staff as possible the second they qualify for the vaccine.

“Although our schools are already reopening safely without widespread vaccinations, we know this will expedite that process and ultimately benefit our students, their families, our educators and staff and our communities as a whole,” Reykdal said.

The program, created through a partnership with Kaiser Permanente, will establish between 14 and 20 vaccination sites that exclusively serve school employees. Currently, sites are planned along the Interstate 5 corridor in Western Washington and around Spokane in the east. Together, those locations should be able to offer vaccines to 80 percent of Washington's public school employees. Plans to support the remaining 20 percent of staff are still under development.

Such vaccinations are still probably some time away. "We are preparing as if we can go launch in about four weeks," Reykdal said. "It's probably more practical to think about this as five or six weeks away, but we know we have to be ready."

The fact that teachers have not been prioritized for earlier vaccination has generated controversy. Leaders from Washington's legislative education committees in mid-January called on state leaders to move school employees up the vaccination queue, arguing that it was unacceptable to leave teachers unvaccinated now that many school districts are bringing children back into the classroom.

Other critics of the state's vaccination phases point to other states that have prioritized teachers. For example, Oregon's vaccination plan already allows child care providers and early learning and K-12 educators and staff to receive the vaccine.

Despite the controversy, Washington's vaccination phases are unlikely to change, Reykdal said. "This announcement does not allow educators to move ahead in the current prioritization. It means when it is their turn, we are ready to move ahead," he said.

Currently, Washington is in Phase 1b1 of vaccine distribution, meaning vaccine doses are only available to health care workers, residents and staff at long-term care facilities and Washingtonians 65 and older or those 50 and older who live in multigenerational households.

Reykdal estimated that about 7,000 school employees currently qualify to receive the vaccine under those guidelines. Some of the remaining 136,000 will become eligible in the next phase, which includes K-12 educators and staff over 50. But it won't be until Phase 1b4 that all other school staff will qualify for the vaccine. As the Department of Health's schedule showed, Phase 1b4 may not happen until summer.

The Get Ready plan should be able to vaccinate school employees within a few weeks once they become eligible, which is relatively quickly compared to previous vaccine rollouts, Reykdal said.

Until then, Reykdal said schools should continue to reopen as long as they follow safety guidelines such as requiring masks and encouraging social distancing. "A vaccine is a tremendous safety net, but it is never the thing that is going to create a perfect scenario," Reykdal said. "Our schools are safe today when they follow the protocols in opening."