When 40 staffers call off sick, Upper Perk schools close
Teachers report wide variety of symptoms after receiving shots
The entire Upper Perkiomen School District closed Friday after a large number of staff members called out sick, saying they experienced side effects after being vaccinated for COVID-19 at a clinic Wednesday, officials said.
More than 40 staff members across the Montgomery County school district’s five schools had put in for a sick day as of 10 p.m. Thursday, Superintendent
Allyn J. Roche wrote in a message to families. Anticipating the potential for more last-minute requests Friday morning, the district decided staffing was not adequate enough to conduct in-person and virtual instruction.
Out of 234 teachers, 41 called out, plus six instructional aides, which the district assumes is mostly due to recent vaccinations, district communications specialist Nikki Gum said. Teachers and other school staff members in Pennsylvania are being prioritized to receive the state’s allotment of the one-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine.
About 175 district staff, including bus drivers, had gotten the vaccine Wednesday afternoon through the Montgomery County Intermediate Unit, Gum said.
The school district made the decision last week to have an entirely virtual school day on Thursday, anticipating that some staff might experience mild side effects after getting the shot and not feel up to teaching in-person. The district is in a hybrid learning model.
“What we weren’t anticipating was in that second day ... folks were still not feeling well,” she said.
Upper Perkiomen teachers rattled off their symptoms in a private Facebook page, union president Robert LaSalle said: headaches, sore arms, bad chills overnight, fever. According to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the most common side effects from the Johnson & Johnson vaccine are pain at the injection site, headache, fatigue, muscle aches and nausea, and usually last one to two days.
LaSalle, a special education teacher, advised his members to let the district know sooner rather than later if they planned to take a sick day on Friday so that the district wasn’t caught in a bind.
A few staff members took a sick day Thursday, Gum said. But in the afternoon and into the evening, requests for sick time on Friday started to pile up. Administrators made the call late that night.
Having 40 staff call out sick wouldn’t cripple the district in a normal year, she said. They would usually be able to move students around or combine some classes. But this year, in a hybrid schedule that maintains six feet of social distancing, that wasn’t feasible, she said.
A portion of staff, like special education teachers, got vaccinated in an earlier wave, LaSalle said. At Wednesday’s clinic, everyone else who has direct contact with children was able to get a shot if they wanted, he said.
Friday was treated like a traditional snow day, which means the end of the 2020-21 school year will be updated. Transportation was provided to students who attend non-public schools, and yearround staff reported for work.
This is the first shutdown Upper Perkiomen has experienced this year, Gum said. The district started out in remote learning, pivoted to hybrid in late January and plans to move to a 4-day in-person model, with the virtual option, on April 6.