President Biden announced a series of actions to encourage more people to get vaccinated. Among these activities, the President announced a call to action for all local school districts to host at least one pop-up vaccination clinic in the coming weeks. The Administration is directing pharmacies in the federal pharmacy program to prioritize this and to work with school districts across the country to host vaccination clinics at schools and colleges. We expect more tools on how to set up successful school-based vaccination clinics to be released in the coming days.
On July 27, the CDC updated its guidance for fully vaccinated people and, as a result, some of the Guidance for COVID-19 Prevention in K-12 Schools. As of now, the CDC has changed the following for K-12 schools:
- The CDC now recommends “universal indoor masking for all teachers, staff, students, and visitors to K-12 schools, regardless of vaccination status.” The CDC still emphasizes that children should return to full-time in-person learning in the fall with layered prevention strategies in place.
- The CDC recommends that a fully vaccinated person who comes into close contact with someone who tests positive for COVID-19 should get tested, under the new guidance. There are no changes to quarantine protocols at this time.
To read the CDC guidance, click here. To read Secretary Cardona’s statement, click here.
- NEW! Restart & Recovery: Addressing Unfinished Learning for the Youngest Learners: As state leaders head into yet another new school year of the COVID-19 pandemic, they are focusing on how to accelerate learning and close the equity gaps that have been exposed and exacerbated by the crisis. This resource will help SEAs understand the problem of unfinished learning and how it has disproportionately impacted children from racial and linguistic minorities. It provides an array of practical strategies state leaders can use to engage early childhood advocates and other members of the education community to develop and deploy accelerated learning plans to equitably close learning gaps among the youngest learners. This report concludes with recommendations for mitigating unfinished learning among young learners through academic, administrative and/or school-community interventions, access it here.
- NEW! Restart & Recovery: Sensible Evaluation of the Pandemic’s Impact on Learning and Achievement: Sensible Evaluation of the Pandemic’s Impact on Learning and Achievement provides guidance for evaluating the impact of the pandemic on student learning and achievement using the data that state education agencies (SEA) have been collecting. It discusses the importance of considering the complexity of the pandemic context in developing state-specific plans for evaluating its impact. It offers a structured process for developing such plans and recommends four general-analysis approaches to help states address the most critical issues related to the impact of the pandemic. This resource concludes by sharing several, high-level principles SEAs can use to guide decision-making as they develop and execute their evaluation agendas, access it here.