Additional doses of Pfizer will be used over the next two weeks to vaccinate Year 12 students across all ACT schools as they prepare to sit their final exams.
ACT Year 12 students and staff required to assist with the ACT Scaling Test (and HSC and IB if occurring at an ACT school) can now book one of 5,500 priority Pfizer vaccination appointments reserved at the AIS mass vaccination clinic during the fortnight from Monday 6 September.
This will allow students to sit their supervised exams in mid-October.
Minister for Education Yvette Berry said the priority vaccination scheme will help alleviate some of the stress associated with finishing Year 12.
“Providing vaccine protection and a level of certainty around assessments will support our young people who are planning for their future in unsettling and uncertain times,” she said.
First dose appointments for students will be made available from 6 to 17 September.
Vaccinations will not be mandatory for students taking their exams.
Teachers, educators and other school staff who have direct contact with students in their daily work at ACT schools, early childhood education and care centres, and out-of-school-hour care services can also make a booking for priority Pfizer appointments in the following weeks.
“Vaccination of our frontline education staff is an important part of returning to face-to-face education when it’s safe to do so,” Ms Berry said.
“Understanding that this virus moves differently through our schools and our early childhood sector, we want to make sure those workers are vaccinated.”
Ms Berry also advised the ACT Education Directorate is working closely with ACT Health and the Chief Health Officer Dr Kerryn Coleman to consider what “a return to face-to-face learning might look like”, with more information expected to be provided closer to term four.
From 13 to 17 September, COVID-19 vaccinations for students aged 12 and over will be delivered to the ACT’s four specialist schools through an in-reach program via Aspen Medical.
The nation’s capital is also set receive between 65,000 and 68,000 doses as part of a newly announced swap with the UK for four million jabs.
Doses are divvied up between jurisdictions on a per capita basis, meaning Chief Minister Andrew Barr expects to receive about a week-and-a-half’s worth of vaccines.
“That means we can bring a lot (of doses) forward, depending of course on exactly when it arrives,” he told reporters on Friday.
Separately, most of the 8,344 doses allocated to the ACT under an earlier announced vaccine swap with Singapore will go to final-year students and teaching staff in direct contact with them.
More information for students and relevant staff on the priority vaccination scheme can be found here.
With AAP
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