Surrey teachers not mandated to get vaccinated, board decides

Surrey’s Board of Education says it will not mandate COVID-19 vaccinations for its staff or teachers.

The school district says it recognizes the importance of vaccines and continues to encourage anyone who is eligible to get the shot.

However, after consultations with public health officials, the Ministry of Education, and the Public School Employers’ Association, it has decided schools are a low-risk setting for transmission and 100 per cent vaccination is not required to keep everyone safe.

It says it weighed the pros and cons of a vaccine mandate and paid particular attention to guidance from public health, which has not recommended a mandate at this point.

**New**: the province left districts to decide whether to mandate staff vaccines or not. Now the province’s biggest district has said they will not.#bcpoli #bced @CityNewsVAN https://t.co/zipgtJvvkB

— LizaYuzda (@LizaYuzda) November 2, 2021

Health officials say the mandate may exacerbate inequities (lower vaccination rates among low-income, racialized minorities) and further entrench those who are opposed to vaccinations, the board said.

“We have an obligation to our community to keep our schools open and to continue providing a safe learning environment for our students. Schools are a low-risk setting for transmission and public health experts have assured us that our schools are safe and that we do not need 100% vaccination rates for safe operation,” a statement released Tuesday morning said. 

Surrey’s school board will also not be seeking voluntary disclosure of vaccine status from staff, but will be gathering information on vaccine status already provided by public health.

Surrey’s decision won’t dictate similar moves in other districts

Education Minister Jennifer Whiteside explains the province is letting districts decide what is best for their specific situation.

“Boards of education, as the employers of employees who work in our school system, make the decision about what to do … for their workforce,” she said.

The vaccination rate of teachers across the province is estimated by their union to be about the same as health care workers who are required to be vaccinated to work.

“We know that in Surrey, we have very high rates of vaccination in the school system. Surrey was prioritized in the spring for vaccination for early vaccination for school-based staff because of the transmission that we were seeing in the community in the spring. And so I understand that the board has gone through a robust process … to make a decision that makes sense for their community,” Whiteside said.

The Fraser Health region continues to have the highest percentage of new cases in the province.

As for why volunteer sports coaches in the community need to be fully vaccinated to work with kids and volunteers coaches at schools do not – she says there are layers of protection in school.

The New Westminster School Board was the first to announce it would not require staff to be immunized. Other school districts have yet to detail what action they will take.