Dozens of colleges and universities have required that students get vaccinated before returning in the fall but the issue poses more complex questions for K-12.
Steady stream of superintendents and school boards make masks optional even as the CDC urges keeping COVID precautions until the end of the school year.
“Of course, we will continue to follow the science, and should there be a localized outbreak or other emergency, we will act accordingly,” Gov. Murphy said. “Otherwise, buildings will be fully open.”
A new incentive program will increase pay for teachers facing some of the greatest challenges in helping students catch up from the pandemic. It relies on more than standardized test scores to measure performance.
“When students drop out, they typically look for an out, an opportunity to leave. And this has provided that, unfortunately,” Sandy Addis, chairman of the National Dropout Prevention Center, said recently, referring to the pandemic.
Officials determining where 12- to 15-year-olds will get shots and whether schools will require COVID vaccines after F.D.A. approves Pfizer-BioNTech for younger teens.
A growing number of school districts, concentrating in the south, have lifted COVID restrictions, allowing students to remove masks when at their desks.
A growing number of superintendents are concerned students are being forced to miss in-person instruction even though their risk of catching COVID is low.
