Is your freshman getting a booster to fulfill college requirement Fall 22?

[Anonymous]

Yeah, both my kids are going to get the booster next month. Both are vaccinated and both had mild Covid. The side effects got all of us were just about a day and nothing serious

[Anonymous]

Yes. Mine has to get the booster for college.

[Anonymous]

whats the big deal?

[Anonymous]

The big deal is that there is no benefit for OP's kid, w/two shots and two covid infections. Only risk. Forcing it is unethical. There is no basis.

(See eg https://www.fda.gov/media/159007/download #38)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The big deal is that there is no benefit for OP's kid, w/two shots and two covid infections. Only risk. Forcing it is unethical. There is no basis.

(See eg https://www.fda.gov/media/159007/download #38)

I agree (I'm not the pp you quoted, but I'm the first respondent at 16:41 yesterday.)
But schools made their position on the vaccine known before decision day (May 1.) As a pp noted, a few (like Rice and Vanderbilt) have actually walked back their requirement for a booster (I'm not aware of any schools that did NOT have a booster requirement on May 1, but have since mandated it.)

If it was important to someone to have a choice to not get the booster, they could have applied to many other schools that not only do not require the booster, but do not require the vaccine at all.

[Anonymous]

^pp at 10:55 here

The students that actually do have room to complain are last year's rising college freshmen (2021)--they applied to and committed to schools when the vaccine was still new and not mandated--THEN were told over the summer and early fall of 2021 about the mandates for vaccines-AFTER it was too late to apply/enroll at another school.
But THIS year's class (freshmen in fall of 2022) knew what they were getting into when they applied to various schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Also WashU does not require a booster. Vandy and Rice no longer have vax mandates.

Hope we see more of this. There is no good reason to require a booster, or really a vax at this point. Especially for teens/young adults. A vax or booster mandate is unnecessary and unethical.

These schools are doing the right thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yeah, both my kids are going to get the booster next month. Both are vaccinated and both had mild Covid. The side effects got all of us were just about a day and nothing serious

That’s great! I’m happy that you are able to get your kids boosted. Truly.

The issue is with mandates. Mandates are wrong and unnecessary. Especially when so many teens/young adults have already had Covid. And especially when we know that vaccinated individuals can still catch and transmit Covid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No one needs a got dam booster at this point. The virus has mutated into just another cold. Look at the way cases are rising but hospitalizations and deaths are staying flat. That's because it's not a deadly virus anymore for the vast majority of people and certainly not for college students. These schools need to stop being insane.

+ 1 million

Maybe people over 65 could benefit from a booster? Otherwise, the only benefit is to Pfizer.

An otherwise healthy 18 year old kid, who already had Covid does NOT need a booster. Natural immunity for the win!

[Anonymous]

Mine got the booster to help protect us as a family, no big deal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Also WashU does not require a booster. Vandy and Rice no longer have vax mandates.

Hope we see more of this. There is no good reason to require a booster, or really a vax at this point. Especially for teens/young adults. A vax or booster mandate is unnecessary and unethical.

These schools are doing the right thing.

According to Jen Psaki (she's so eloquent!) "mandates work." You know, if you threaten to destroy someone's life unless they do what you say--and you actually have the power to destroy their life--there is a high likelihood they will comply. Funny how "it works" that way!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The big deal is that there is no benefit for OP's kid, w/two shots and two covid infections. Only risk. Forcing it is unethical. There is no basis.

(See eg https://www.fda.gov/media/159007/download #38)

I agree (I'm not the pp you quoted, but I'm the first respondent at 16:41 yesterday.)
But schools made their position on the vaccine known before decision day (May 1.) As a pp noted, a few (like Rice and Vanderbilt) have actually walked back their requirement for a booster (I'm not aware of any schools that did NOT have a booster requirement on May 1, but have since mandated it.)

If it was important to someone to have a choice to not get the booster, they could have applied to many other schools that not only do not require the booster, but do not require the vaccine at all.

Yes! Colleges can set their requirements. You can choose not to attend if you don't want to follow it. Colleges have had vaccination reqs for decades. Some even require Meningitis B vax, others don't. My kid can't attend most universities without the whole slew of vaccinations, similar to what was required in K-12 as well. If you are a Health sciences major, you may have even more reqs. My DC is employed at a company involved in the Healthcare industry, and guess what, since they have to travel to "healthcare sites", they are required to get a TB test done (and follow up with treatment I'd assume if they happen to test positive). It's part of the job reqs. Don't like it, they can find another job. Similarly they are required to be up to date on all other vaccines, including covid and a booster. I for one would prefer anyone I might encounter in healthcare setting to be fully vaxed for all diseases.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The big deal is that there is no benefit for OP's kid, w/two shots and two covid infections. Only risk. Forcing it is unethical. There is no basis.

(See eg https://www.fda.gov/media/159007/download #38)

I agree (I'm not the pp you quoted, but I'm the first respondent at 16:41 yesterday.)
But schools made their position on the vaccine known before decision day (May 1.) As a pp noted, a few (like Rice and Vanderbilt) have actually walked back their requirement for a booster (I'm not aware of any schools that did NOT have a booster requirement on May 1, but have since mandated it.)

If it was important to someone to have a choice to not get the booster, they could have applied to many other schools that not only do not require the booster, but do not require the vaccine at all.

Yes! Colleges can set their requirements. You can choose not to attend if you don't want to follow it. Colleges have had vaccination reqs for decades. Some even require Meningitis B vax, others don't. My kid can't attend most universities without the whole slew of vaccinations, similar to what was required in K-12 as well. If you are a Health sciences major, you may have even more reqs. My DC is employed at a company involved in the Healthcare industry, and guess what, since they have to travel to "healthcare sites", they are required to get a TB test done (and follow up with treatment I'd assume if they happen to test positive). It's part of the job reqs. Don't like it, they can find another job. Similarly they are required to be up to date on all other vaccines, including covid and a booster. I for one would prefer anyone I might encounter in healthcare setting to be fully vaxed for all diseases.

+1 from college faculty. Families who don't work in higher ed, use your imagination about the human petri dish that is a college campus. Now multiply that by 100, stop washing your hands, and share your beverage with the 6 nearest people around you, even if you've never met them before. Even before covid, college students were sick *constantly*. Anything you can immunize against, do it, and any healthy behaviors you can promote (including basic things like nutrition and sleep), do it.

As PPs have said, families of rising college freshmen are completely free to decline admissions offers at any time from schools with whose policies (of any kind) they disagree. And absolute truth to tell, as inconvenient or expensive or disappointing or frustrating or bait-and-switch or wasteful as it might seem, older students are also completely free to take a gap year or transfer out if they don't want their school's covid mandates. No one is forcibly trapped in college.

[Anonymous]

There were kids forced out mid-semester this past spring.

Covid vax and booster mandates violate basic medical ethics. Not to mention are coercive, which is prohibited under EUA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There were kids forced out mid-semester this past spring.

Covid vax and booster mandates violate basic medical ethics. Not to mention are coercive, which is prohibited under EUA.

Again, the students who left chose to leave because they chose not to take the vaccine. I am not pretending that is an easy choice, but it is still an available choice. They were not forced to stay and accept a shot.

Colleges can and do change all kinds of policies in the midst of students' careers. Vaccine requirements do get added (meningitis, as other have noted, is a more recent one at many schools); definitions of academic dishonesty get rewritten and differently enforced; political and social disputes provoke governance shifts; tuition gets increased; majors and even entire departments get discontinued. Students are always free to go at any point when they do not like those changes.