Back to school? Speed up vaccinations

Addresses from the governor early in each legislative session — just like a presidential State of the Union — generally are laundry lists of policy proposals that are light on actual news. Not this year in New Mexico, where Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham spoke virtually to the Legislature and the state Tuesday, calling for children to return to their classrooms by Feb. 8, using a hybrid model of in-person and virtual learning.

That’s in just under two weeks, for anyone without a calendar.

This is big news, with a clear goal to get children into a classroom with a teacher, instead of separated by a computer screen.

Though it appears the governor’s pledge allows districts room to maneuver, the pronouncement likely will make the remainder of the bewitched 2020-21 school year a strange mosaic — one putting individual school superintendents and boards of education on a hot seat (as if they weren’t already).

Theoretically, the governor’s decision allows school districts to manage their reentry plans to fit community needs. But it doesn’t really address how to convince teachers to willingly return to the classroom without being vaccinated against the coronavirus.

That’s particularly true in Santa Fe, where many teachers opted not to “volunteer” to return in the short-lived hybrid learning model in the fall.

Until entire school staffs can be vaccinated, it’s hard to see how a return plan can be managed.

Read the governor’s words: “None of you — no educator, no school worker — should ever have to choose between your health and the students you serve.” If they are to be believed, teachers have the choice of teaching virtually, which means a lot of empty classrooms across New Mexico.

That’s why the end of COVID-19, and in many ways, a robust return to school, will boil down to one word: vaccine.

Teachers want to be vaccinated before they return to in-person classes. Their fears of contracting COVID-19, or worse, spreading it to their own families, are not unreasonable. Even in a hybrid learning environment, they have no idea what their students have been exposed to in their own worlds away from school.

School districts that want to restart the engine for in-person learning have to reassure teachers (not to mention parents) that testing and tracing are available to deal with potential spread, that personal protective equipment is plentiful and that school sites are set up for social distancing. But school staff members also need to know they will be receiving vaccinations.

For her part, Santa Fe Public Schools Superintendent Veronica García has said her schools have been set up correctly and believes testing protocols are in place to run hybrid programs. Still, she and other superintendents have to persuade teachers they will be safe upon their return.

With that as the backdrop, the burden reverts to the state and federal governments. It’s one thing to say you want to open schools, but it’s quite another to deliver enough vaccines to make that happen.

It helps that President Joe Biden announced his administration can increase the weekly vaccine supply from 8.6 million doses to states to a minimum of 10 million doses — with the guarantee of a reliable three-week supply. The federal government also is promising to purchase 200 million additional vaccine doses, double the U.S. supply.

Biden, if you remember, had promised one of his first priorities as president is to reopen public schools across the country. Making vaccines available is key to making that happen.

Meanwhile, the state’s public schools — including middle and high schools — now can return using the hybrid model. It’s important to note the Feb. 8 deadline does not mean schools are going to operate as they had in pre-COVID-19 days. It just means they can begin the road back to something approaching normalcy.

Making the pledge in a State of the State speech underscores how essential it is for children to be back in their classrooms. But that pledge will be hollow if teachers won’t return to work because they don’t feel safe. That’s why the state must redouble efforts to put vaccines into the arms of school staff members.

Otherwise, the words don’t matter.