The chairs of Hamilton’s public and Catholic school boards both say they’re pleased about a full return to in-person learning for students this fall, but they’re both also hoping COVID-19 vaccination rates among youth aged 12 to 17 will increase before classes begin.
“We are excited about the return of in-person learning every day for all students, with remote learning as an option,” wrote Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board (HWDSB) chair Dawn Danko and HWDSB director of education Manny Figueiredo in a joint statement on Tuesday.
“We expect more information to come on extracurriculars, contract tracing and other details. We will share a comprehensive COVID-19 update for families in the days ahead.”
Speaking to Global News, Danko said she’s optimistic that schools won’t need to close this year because of the availability of vaccines for school staff, parents, and high school students.
“It’s easy to have rose-coloured glasses on right now because the numbers have been low … but one of the key factors, one of the key strategies we have against COVID-19 is vaccinations. And seeing the numbers go up in Hamilton and in Ontario for adults, but also for our youth, that’s going to be the difference, I think, this fall.”
To date, 50 per cent of Hamilton youth aged 12 to 17 have received both doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, while 68.5 per cent have had one dose.
Danko said they have asked the Ministry of Education if vaccination clinics in schools could be one potential method of getting more students vaccinated, but have yet to hear back.
Pat Daly, chair of the Hamilton-Wentworth Catholic District School Board (HWCDSB), said he’d also like to see those numbers go up.
“We, for sure, would like to get it much, much higher,” said Daly on Tuesday.
“I know that, having been on the call earlier today, that the Minister of Education, the Minister of Health and others are looking at all possibilities in terms of increasing the availability of the vaccine, including I hope … in our secondary schools. Whatever it takes to expedite young people getting vaccinated, we’re in support of that.”
During a funding announcement on Wednesday, education minister Stephen Lecce said the province is encouraging students to get vaccinated but will not make vaccination mandatory to attend school.
“Our government has been clear, our premier has been clear — we will not mandate vaccine requirement for schools and for staff at this point,” said Lecce. “Our aim is to encourage vaccination at a voluntary level.”
Dr. Kieran Moore, Ontario’s medical officer of health, echoed that sentiment during a briefing on Tuesday, saying the vaccination numbers are “tracking in a very good direction.”
The province has also announced an additional $25 million for improving ventilation in classrooms and communal school settings like gyms, cafeterias and libraries.
During Wednesday’s announcement, Lecce said every classroom in schools without mechanical ventilation systems will have a standalone HEPA unit when school begins.
He added that every junior and senior kindergarten classroom will have a HEPA unit, regardless of the school’s ventilation system, since those kids will not be required to wear masks.
Jeff Sorensen, president of the Hamilton-Wentworth Elementary Teachers’ Local, said he’s concerned there isn’t enough time to make sure all classrooms have enhanced ventilation in place by September.
“The largest segment of the population that will be unvaccinated will be five-year-olds to 12-year-olds, and we’re putting them into these buildings, many of them fairly old,” said Sorensen.
“When I was in the classroom — and we were in a fairly new school — our HVAC systems were horrible, always breaking down. We had a joke that our air conditioning broke down every May and was fixed every October. So there’s not a lot of confidence there that ventilation systems, air quality will be as good as it’s perhaps suggested it’s going to be.”
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Sorensen also said the reopening plan has elementary students mixing cohorts even more than in the previous school year, which is problematic for students that cannot be vaccinated.
“More kids are going to be moving more every day. They’re going to be grouping more every day, even assemblies, extracurriculars, athletics, music class … so we’re putting in an increased load on these ventilation systems. We certainly want to make sure that they’re working ahead of time.”
While some U.S. states are reporting increases in the number of hospitalizations among children as a result of the Delta variant, Canadian pediatric hospitals have told Global News that they aren’t currently seeing the same increase in hospitalizations or more severe infections in young people.
Canada’s top doctor said on Tuesday that it appears the fourth wave will be driven by the Delta variant and will be primarily prevalent among the unvaccinated, including young people.
– with files from The Canadian Press and Amanda Connolly, Global News
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