The Biden administration today announced it will direct all states to prioritize educators for vaccinations, with the goal of every educator and school staff member receiving at least one shot by the end of March. Mike Magee, CEO of Chiefs for Change, a bipartisan network of state and district education leaders serving more than 7 million students, today issued the following statement praising the administration’s actions.
“For weeks, Chiefs for Change has been urging federal and state officials to make all teachers and school staff immediately eligible for vaccination. We applaud the Biden administration for moving forward with its directive to ensure educators are prioritized. With millions of students across the country facing significant learning loss, we must use every tool at our disposal, including vaccinations, to get both students and teachers back into classrooms safely and as quickly as possible.
Today’s announcement by the White House is a step in the right direction, but we don’t need to wait to bring students back for critical in-person learning, as long as key health measures—such as masking, distancing, and robust COVID-19 testing programs—are in place. We continue to urge the federal government and states to direct all necessary resources and funding toward proper safety measures, along with vaccinations, so we can get our students back into classrooms now.”
