Updated Aug. 18, at 10:14 a.m.
With the fall semester fast approaching, most Vermont colleges say they expect the vast majority of their students to be vaccinated against Covid-19, which experts say is particularly important in congregate living situations like dorms.
Still, colleges that require Covid-19 vaccinations grant exemptions on medical and religious grounds. And rates of exemption vary widely across Vermont campuses — up to a high of 9% of students at Norwich University who have been allowed to forgo vaccinations — raising concerns about controlling spread in a college setting.
The goal for colleges should be “as close to 100% [vaccination] as possible,” said Anne Sosin, a rural health researcher and policy fellow at Dartmouth College’s Nelson A. Rockefeller Center for Public Policy.
“This virus is really difficult to control in places where people are living and working in close quarters,” Sosin said.
Both St. Michael’s College and Champlain College anticipate 99% of students will be vaccinated by the time the school year starts, according to Sandy Yusen, Champlain College director of communications and external relations, and Dawn Ellinwood, St. Michael’s dean of students and vice president for student affairs. St. Mike’s has granted exemptions to just 24 of its roughly 1,500 students, Ellinwood said.
At the University of Vermont, the vaccination rate for students had topped 90% as of last week and was increasing, UVM spokesperson Enrique Corredera told VTDigger at the time. The university does not require employees to be vaccinated, nor are administrators keeping track of employee vaccination status, he said.
Corredera did not respond to a follow-up question on Tuesday afternoon about how many exemptions have been granted so far. Following publication of this story, Corredera said Wednesday morning that the student vaccination rate had since exceeded 98%.
Meanwhile, Norwich University has granted 9% of its students exemptions from the college’s vaccination requirement, according to Daphne E. Larkin, director of media relations and community affairs. Larkin declined to provide a breakdown of how many exemptions were for medical or religious reasons.
“Our community is so small that we have to be really careful about what we share publicly, because it’s easy to violate an individual’s privacy unwittingly by sharing details like that,” she said.
So far, 89% of Norwich employees are vaccinated, with 3% receiving exemptions and another 8% yet to report, according to Larkin.
Middlebury College “will know about numbers and percentages regarding exemptions later this month,” said Sarah Ray, director of media relations.
The Community College of Vermont does not require its students nor employees on its 12 campuses to be vaccinated.
Colleges also vary in how they plan to manage unvaccinated people.
Unvaccinated students at Norwich, plus a random sample of vaccinated students, will be tested upon arrival and seven days later, according to Larkin. The school will not conduct surveillance testing, but will regularly test student-athletes, in line with the Great Northeast Athletic Conference rules, Larkin said.
St. Michael’s College will require unvaccinated students to provide proof of a negative test result before arrival and submit to weekly testing, according to the school’s website. Unvaccinated students “may also need to comply with guidelines around quarantine, masking, and limitations on gatherings and visitors that vaccinated students may no longer need to follow,” reads the vaccination exemption request form.
Middlebury is not conducting surveillance testing, but plans to test and quarantine all students who are not fully vaccinated upon arrival. Students will be released from quarantine after a week and three negative test results, Ray said.
Most Vermont colleges now require that both the vaccinated and unvaccinated wear masks indoors. Vermont’s residential state schools — Northern Vermont University, Castleton University and Vermont Technical College — announced on Friday that they were instituting masking mandates. Norwich announced the same on Wednesday, joining the Community College of Vermont, Middlebury College, St. Michael’s College and the University of Vermont, each of which made similar announcements earlier this month.
