At least three private schools in Los Angeles County have offered their teachers and other staff a way to obtain COVID-19 vaccines during a limited supply period – one school urging them to use restricted access codes and two others certifying that their employees were responsible for health related duties.
The actions of the three schools – Alverno Heights Academy in Sierra Madre, Westmark School in Encino and Mirman School in Brentwood – are featured in school emails, meeting minutes and letters provided to The Times by various school staff members.
The actions of administrators to quickly ensure staff vaccination during a period of severely limited doses – a critical issue for all public and private campuses – show how some private schools are willing to boldly interpret the rules in their quest to bring in students from back to school safely and protect employees.
It also offers another example of difficult choices, as essential workers, people aged 65 and over, and educators compete for vaccines available in California.
Some officials, however, expressed discomfort with the instructions, saying that their journey to the front of the vaccination queue had shifted to an ethical gray area.
Administrators defended their assertive actions, saying they responsibly followed strict safety protocols in operating their campuses, while helping employees look for available opportunities to find vaccines within government guidelines.
“We believe that vaccinating teachers is a critical element in ensuring the well-being of our community,” said Alverno Heights in a statement. “To that end, we encourage our employees to follow all relevant guidelines and obtain the vaccine as soon as they can and when vaccine supplies are available.”
Meanwhile, public school districts, accountable to elected officials and school councils – and under greater public scrutiny – have mobilized for vaccines with state and local public health officials with limited success. LA County health officials said school officials are generally not entitled to vaccines until March 1, when supplies will fall far short of demand.
A glimpse of an unauthorized alternative pathway emerged this month, when Northridge Hospital Medical Center provided vaccine appointments directly to 14 private schools and day care centers, including Wesley School in North Hollywood, where a senior hospital executive had a child enrolled.
The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health said these actions violated vaccination guidelines.
There are also several examples of private schools that seem to have fully adhered to the policies of the county health department.
When this became possible in October, all three schools brought back some or all of their youngest students in weeks – using exemptions that were permitted by state and municipal rules. And they also moved to open all elementary grades, which has been possible since February 16 because of declining rates of coronavirus infection.
Alverno Heights and Westmark are bringing back a large number of high school students.
Although the documentation suggests that schools wanted all of their staff to seek vaccination immediately, schools stopped ordering them to do so. Administrators declined to say how many employees were vaccinated.
All team members who spoke to The Times asked to remain anonymous because they feared for their jobs. Alverno Heights policy does not allow staff to speak to the media without permission.
An access code for vulnerable communities
For Alverno, an independent Catholic school, the pandemic hit at an inopportune moment, when the venerable all-female high school was adding a program for boys and girls from kindergarten through eighth grade. The school enrollment fee – not including additional fees – is about $ 22,000 a year.
The push for a vaccine was expressed in emails sent by senior administrators. An e-mail from February 18 established several methods for team members to protect vaccines:
“Option 1” was to go to myturn.ca.gov, the state’s appointment scheduling website and “check both boxes and your age group, select ‘Education and childcare’, choose Los Angeles County and enter the following accessibility code ‘LA2S5R9’”.
This specific code, which was active last week, and other codes were provided to community organizations for distribution in low-income communities hit especially by the pandemic, said Darrel Ng, senior communications consultant for the state’s COVID-19 Vaccine Task Force , in an email response to The Times.
But, apparently, there was a gap.
In the guidance provided to “community partners”, a state official wrote that, as of February 16, those eligible to use consultation codes at a mass vaccination site in Cal State LA would include “educators and child care workers” . This stipulation appears to have allowed employees of Alverno and at least one other private school to make appointments.
However, that same guideline also states: “The focus of these vaccination sites is to provide equitable access to safe, life-saving vaccines for communities in California that have been heavily affected by COVID-19.”
An Alverno employee reported: “I called the vaccine hotline to make an appointment and read the code for them and said, ‘Am I eligible to use this code?’ And they said, ‘Oh, that code was given to community leaders in hard-hit areas to use’ ”.
The official told The Times: “We are trying to live what Jesus wants us to do, and Jesus does not want us to do [to do this]. This is a morally wrong thing that goes against everything we stand for as a school. “
The Alverno administration refused to answer questions about the use of the access code.
Two days later, on February 20, a different senior administrator sent an email to the team, suggesting that meetings were available, as long as they claimed membership with Long Beach. The city’s health department had begun offering vaccine schedules to local schools in late January – an example of the availability of patchwork vaccines that frustrated school leaders in areas where their employees were not yet eligible.
“Many appointments have just been posted to Cal State LA’s drive thru website,” said the administrator in the email. “I went to myturn.ca.gov and put Long Beach as your county – you can enter all the correct information, including age and education.”
A separate email also reminded the team to make sure to list an affiliation with Long Beach.
The adequacy of such efforts came at a Zoom team meeting on February 3, according to the minutes of the meeting provided to The Times.
“Please try to make an appointment. If you have a QR code, they are letting people into Dodger Stadium and they are not asking to see any work cards, ”said school director Julia Fanara, according to the minutes, which paraphrased her statements. “However, it may not be considered ethical to skip the line to get the vaccine from a healthcare professional. This is a decision that you must make for yourself. “
Upon receiving copies of the minutes and e-mails, the school did not question its authenticity, but stated, in a note provided by Fanara, that its function was to provide information to employees and that vaccination was not necessary.
School staff “health duties”
The Westmark School in Encino specializes in educating children from second to 12th grade who have “clinically diagnosed language-based learning disabilities,” said school principal Claudia Koochek.
This year’s tuition was $ 52,446, with a new student fee of $ 2,000.
In a January 15 communication reviewed by The Times, school leaders warned “teachers and staff” that they had “prepared a letter of verification” that would allow them to get a vaccination on the grounds that “you are an employee at Westmark School , and from time to time, you can participate in activities related to the health office. ”
These functions, according to the letter, could include supervising the health office and checking the temperature at the main gate. The letter also said that three employees who had submitted the letter were vaccinated.
In a statement to The Times, Koochek said his employees were eligible for vaccines because the school had a “health office” and any staff member who worked on campus had potential direct responsibilities related to keeping everyone safe.
The school’s approach and its “documentation have been reviewed and verbally approved by staff at the vaccination site,” said Koochek, who declined to say who performed the review or when.
“We took advantage of the opportunity provided by the consultation system that was offered by several health organizations that offered consultations for the education / childcare sector with a health office on campus,” she said. “We chose this option because we are a school with a health department.”
The Times communicated with four employees who said the letter did not correctly describe their role or that of most others at school. They differently characterized the letter as inaccurate or unethical.
“Although I want to be vaccinated as soon as possible as part of the national distribution effort, I and many other co-workers with whom I spoke are morally opposed to skipping the line, especially when it would require being dishonest about our real jobs,” said one Westmark employee.
The Los Angeles County Department of Education said on Thursday that before March 1, the exemption that allows school staff to be vaccinated is limited.
“Staff from the school health department (nurses, health assistants) are eligible to receive the vaccine during Phase 1A as health professionals,” said spokeswoman Margo Minecki.
The Mirman School in Brentwood describes its niche as serving talented elementary and high school students, charging tuition ranging from about $ 34,000 to $ 38,000, with a new student fee of $ 2,250.
The school’s leaders followed a similar reasoning to that of Westmark in a January 20 communication with the team:
“As you all work directly with students who can be potentially infectious, you are the first in line before the Health Coordinator to help any sick student, participate in daily health exams during the free ride and at the entrance gate, you fall into the current municipal guidelines for vaccinations. “
The school provided a link to make appointments and a model letter “To whom it may interest” that employees can present, signed by the School Principal Dan Vorenberg:
“As a team member, (insert name) works full time for Mirman and has direct responsibility for all students, while working providing the necessary support to our Health Coordinator throughout the school day in support of the provision of health services to our student, ”says the letter in part. “They are responsible for daily wellness checks, are the first to respond in the case of a sick child, have direct exposure to potentially infectious children and are trained in protocols relating to the Covid-19 response on campus.”
Ericka Dean, Mirman’s director of marketing and communications, said the school “found it prudent to share this information with our team, as it is our duty to ensure their continued safety, in addition to protecting the well-being of our families.”
Times staff writers Laura J. Nelson and Julia Wick contributed to this report.