VTA chooses politics
I am disgusted at the lengths the Vacaville Teachers Association and surrounding unions have gone to try and save face after a year of outright refusal to return to inperson learning. As a previous board member, I was fighting to get kids back in class since summer 2020.
Dr. Bela Matyas has been clear in his belief since the beginning of the pandemic: Schools should never have closed down. He spent hours at a special board meeting explaining the science, safety and considerations for schools. He offered partnership to develop a plan to get kids and teachers safely back on campuses for in-person learning.
He was clear in his decision to offer the teachers vaccination. He was not going to expedite teachers receiving vaccinations before other people in the rollout without justification; supporting districts getting back to in-person learning.
If there is no guarantee the unions would actually go back after being vaccinated, our Public Health Officer could not in good conscience waste vaccine. If unions agreed to sign MOUs and/or contracts with their districts expressly stating return to in-person learning, Dr. Matyas was willing to move them up in line. He explained that by providing vaccines to teachers, he’d be moving them up on the rollout schedule — essentially bumping others. Based on evaluated risk and OSHA regulations, teachers as a cohort are not considered higher risk than other groups of people. So he absolutely did the right thing by setting the expectation of a contractual return to work to justify administering the vaccine.
The union has used vaccines as a tool to continue to fight to stay out of the classroom and keep our kids from returning to in-person learning.
Vacaville Unified began investing in safety and worked diligently to build a phased return plan to satisfy all of VTA’s demands. No one has ever suggested that schools re-open traditionally. There has been an approved plan that safety re-opens over time through with an average of 10-13 students in a classroom at any given time. All types of PPE have been procured: Cloth masks, paper masks, shields, gloves, plexiglass dividers. Air purifiers for every classroom certified to kill Covid-19 that cycles the air multiple times per hour. A robust sanitation plan and special grade machines on each campus. The administration worked diligently to plan for how kids entered and exited to maintain distance not just while in class but coming and going, lunch plans, etc. All this incredible work by the district, while VTA continues to kick the can, move the goal and dig their heels in.
It’s sad that the VTA has chosen politics over integrity. Our community should be outraged at the lies and lengths they are showing they are willing to go to save face.
— Tracee Stacy/Vacaville