Update: The University System of Maryland, which includes the flagship University of Maryland, College Park and other nearby universities like Bowie State, will require students, faculty and staff to get vaccines before returning to campus.

USM Chancellor Jay Perman announced the change on Friday. He said he looked at the situation from a population-level risk/benefit analysis.

“If we examine the data—and there is an extraordinary accumulation of data—we see that the risk of vaccines is very low, whereas the risk of COVID is very high,” Perman said in a statement. “And that risk is increasingly falling on young people. This is no longer a disease for the old.”

He said the university is preparing for “more infectious, more harmful variants that we think could be circulating on our campuses come fall. … We’ve been living with COVID for so long now that we forget we’re still in the middle of a public health emergency.”

Exemptions will be allowed for medical or religious reasons.

Perman said he wants students to be able to study together, learn together, and hang out.

“We want students to have these bonding opportunities. We want them to have a college experience that breeds a sense of belonging,” he said.

The university system has about 15,000 students on campuses and they expect that number to double in the fall.

Original:

More than a year after the coronavirus pandemic brought in-person instruction to a grinding halt, colleges and universities across the region are hoping the increasing availability of COVID-19 vaccines could signal a return to some semblance of normal campus life this fall.

But with just a few months to go before the start of the fall semester, a growing number of institutions across the region are grappling with whether to mandate the vaccine for students who plan to return to campus.

In late March, Rutgers University became one of the first schools in the U.S. to announce such a mandate; at least a handful of other schools, including Johns Hopkins University, George Washington University, Georgetown University, Trinity Washington University, University of the District of Columbia, and American University have since followed suit. (American University holds the license to WAMU, which owns DCist.)

George Koor is a research librarian and writing professor at AU, and says he’s already received his vaccine and thinks the mandate will allow the university to provide a more robust college experience for students.

“The urgency is on behalf of the staff,” Koor, told DCist/WAMU. “As librarians we are placed in public-facing service spots that would not be safe without a mandate.”

Daniel Ryan, a graduate student studying public relations at GWU, says he received his first dose of the Pfizer vaccine and thinks GWU decision to mandate it sends a clear message to students and staff.

“It makes it very clear,” Ryan said. “What you don’t want is gray area and some people not getting the vaccine, but still being allowed to attend class.”

When asked recently at a press conference about students needing to get vaccinated at local campuses, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser responded, “I love it!”

“We know that the students miss college life. And we also know that this will help with all of the university operations, including their ability to bring their staff back, so we think that it’s a great idea. It’s good that these announcements are being made early so that the young people are making a plan to get vaccinated at home before they come to school,” Bowser said.

On May 24, American University announced it will require COVID-19 vaccinations for all faculty and staff with an on-campus presence this fall. The university said that faculty and staff can request a medical or religious exemption to the vaccine. George Washington University and Trinity Washington University also are requiring faculty and staff to be immunized. University of the District of Columbia is requiring full vaccination for staff and faculty who plan to access school facilities starting in fall 2021.

But some schools in the region have stopped short of requiring the vaccine for students, faculty, and staff, instead “urging” or “encouraging” members of their university communities to get the shot. That’s the case at Virginia Tech, where they’ve opined that they can’t mandate the vaccine because it has been authorized only for emergency use by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

In northern Virginia, George Mason University started debating the matter earlier this month. University President Gregory Washington told the Washington Business Journal that he wants students to return to in-person learning this fall. The campus has already set up a clinic to encourage students to get the vaccine.

“We haven’t decided how we are going to handle that yet in terms of a mandate,” Washington told the Journal. “But I feel very strongly that students should be vaccinated when they come to campus and interact with other students.”

The University System of Maryland’s Board of Regents voted Friday to give the Chancellor Jay Perman the authority to create a COVID-19 vaccination policy for the fall. And Perman, who is a doctor, made his position on the need for vaccinations clear.

“I believe that vaccination is necessary, and that vaccination is especially necessary on college campuses,” Perman told the board. “Widespread vaccination is how we’ll have a fall semester that resembles our pre-pandemic normal.”

That vote by the board came after Sandra Benson Bradley from the Maryland attorney general’s office wrote in a legal opinion that “if [University System of Maryland] has sufficient evidence that mandatory vaccinations are reasonably required to protect the public health and safety, USM could legally mandate vaccinations. USM would likely have to provide reasonable accommodations for medical conditions or religious objections.”

Bradley noted in her letter that a number of court cases have already upheld mandatory vaccinations: In 1905, the Supreme Court upheld a mandate for the smallpox vaccination, in 1922 the high court said vaccines could be mandated in public and private schools, and in 1944 the court determined that religious freedom does not allow individuals the liberty to spread disease in their surrounding community. Bradley concluded her legal opinion by stating that “USM’s decision to mandate is reasonable and necessary to control COVID-19 and prevent campus outbreaks.”

Dr. Leana Wen, a public health expert at GWU, agrees the vaccine is necessary to prevent campus outbreaks. Wen says it’s typical for schools and businesses to mandate vaccinations against diseases including measles, mumps, rubella, and chicken pox. A survey of 100 four-year institutions in the U.S. shows that almost 85% already mandate the vaccine for measles, mumps, and rubella.

“This is about protecting the health and wellbeing of the other people there,” Wen told DCist/WAMU. “I think that [the COVID vaccine] needs to be seen as an extension of the health screening that is already being done.”

Wen says schools’ other options for preventing transmission is continuous symptom checking and surveillance testing, “but proof of vaccination is the most expedient and most effective way of getting there.”

Colleen Grablick, Jordan Pascale and Cydney Grannan contributed reporting.

This story was updated with additional schools that are mandating the vaccine.