Hundreds of staffers at schools get vaccine

Nearly 1,300 Marin school employees received their first vaccination shots Sunday at the Marin County Civic Center in San Rafael.

“It was better than amazing,” Mary Jane Burke, Marin superintendent of schools, said Monday.

Close to 100 volunteers from Kaiser Permanente Medical Center and from schools throughout the county helped to vaccinate 1,282 employees in the tier 1 priority of school workers. Those include custodians, food service workers, bus drivers and special education and special day class teachers.

The remaining tiers of school workers — teachers doing inperson learning, distance learning teachers and other personnel — will be folded in over the next week or two, Burke said. They will need to find space among the other high-priority group scheduled for

vaccinations: Marin residents 65 and older.

Burke said she is seeking more volunteers to help with the rest of teacher vaccinations during off hours. The normal Marin County vaccination schedule is from about 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily.

The launch of school employee vaccinations came as Marin public high schools administrators announced that their students will be staying in remote learning longer than expected because coronavirus numbers are still too high.

At San Rafael City Schools, students in the district’s middle and high schools will not begin a return to in-person learning until at least March 1, the district said. That date would only be in effect if Marin is in the red tier, the state’s second highest virus ranking in its tracking system, for the prior two weeks. Marin is currently in the purple tier, the state’s highest.

“I completely understand that it is difficult to discuss in-person learning while the state and nation are in the

throes of unprecedented Covid case numbers and tragic number of deaths each day,” Jim Hogeboom, the San Rafael schools superintendent, said in a letter to parents.

“However, the overall number of cases per 100,000 people in Marin is finally starting to decline,” he added. “With more vaccines coming soon, I am hopeful that we will soon see the community prevalence decrease.”

High schools in the Tamalpais Union, Novato Unified and Shoreline Unified districts also said they are waiting for Marin to enter the red tier before estimating any dates for reopening for in-person learning.

“We will open when the Covid numbers allow it,” said Tara Taupier, superintendent of the Tam Union district. “Under current guidelines, we can open two weeks after the county returns to the red tier.”

At Novato Unified, spokesperson Leslie Benjamin said the district has a mix of target dates.

“NUSD sixth graders returned on Nov. 30 in a hybrid model and are continuing,” she said in an email Monday. “Seventh to 10th graders will return two weeks after Marin County

exits the purple tier into the red tier. Eleventh and 12th graders will return one week after that — or three weeks after entering the red tier.”

At Shoreline Unified, the lower grades are returning in stages, while the upper grades are still in remote instruction, said Bob Raines, the superintendent.

“SUSD’s transitional kindergarten, kindergarten and first grades were back in class last Wednesday, as well as some second and eighth graders,” Raines said in an email Monday. “The rest of the second graders, all third graders, and some fourth, fifth and sixth graders will come back on the 20th. The rest of K-6 and some seventh will return on the 27th. “

Raines said the district is also “opening learning hubs for middle schoolers and high schoolers this week on our campuses in anticipation of getting the go ahead to bring the rest of secondary back on campus from public health.”

In San Rafael, Hogeboom said the district has reached a tentative agreement with San Rafael Teachers Association, which represents teachers in grades kindergarten through eighth grade, for re-entry to in-person learning. The union is

expected to bring the agreement before members for a ratification vote this week, he said.

“For planning purposes, our next target date for reentry is March 1,” Hogeboom said. “We believe this will give us time to make sure we are well prepared at each school.”

In the elementary schools, San Rafael is continuing a phased-in approach for transitional kindergarten through fifth grade using a hybrid plan four days per week and mostly remote recorded lessons on Mondays. For the next phase, the district plans to increase the amount of instructional time during the in-person classes.

“We will continue safety procedures including frequent hand-washing, mask wearing, upgraded ventilation systems and the frequent use of outdoor spaces for instruction,” Hogeboom said. “We are planning to move to the modified day schedule when it is safe, which will not be before March 1 and only after Marin has entered the orange tier.”

The orange tier 3 represents “moderate” virus transmission and is the state’s third highest virus ranking.