Chicago school board considers giving CPS authority to make COVID vaccine mandatory for employment
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CHICAGO (WLS) The Chicago School Board is considering a rule that would give the head of Chicago Public Schools the authority to make getting the COVID-19 vaccine a condition for employment within CPS.
The school board is set to vote on the rule Wednesday. The rule would also allow CPS to call on employees to report to work in person.
The policy would give CPS CEO Janice Jackson the authority to possibly mandate the vaccine as a condition of employment. The Chicago Teachers Union is already pushing back, even though CTU spent months fighting for its members to receive vaccinations before returning to school.
Jackson said she formally reached out to CTU last week to begin the process of returning high school students back to the classroom and expect to meet later this week. CPS officials said a joint task force is being created with the union.
Officials also announced the opening of three new high school learning hub locations in March:
Richards Career Academy High School (60 students)
George H. Corliss High School (60 students)
William H. Wells Community Academy High School (50 students)
According to CPS, community-based organizations will staff and manage the learning hubs. Officials added that only students enrolled at the three high schools will be eligible to enroll in the hubs.
The Chicago Board of Education is set to vote Wednesday on a new policy that would allow Chicago Public Schools to require employees to get the COVID-19 vaccine.
After members of the Chicago Teachers Union approved a deal with Chicago Public Schools to return to in-person learning, Mayor Lori Lightfoot and CPS leadership.
“We have 4-year-olds asking who is their teacher is today?” McGehee said.
About 6,000 children all of them preschoolers and children with complex disabilities were welcomed back in CPS classrooms Monday for the first time in 300 days, along with 1,200 teachers and 1,700 clinicians.
Nearly 150 employees who chose not to return to their buildings were informed they were would be shut out of their CPS Google Classroom accounts and would not be paid.
CTU President Jesse Sharkey said a majority of CPS families, like McGehee’s, are choosing to stay remote, yet about three-quarters of employees are being called back to buildings, sometimes teaching to classrooms with just one student.