Vigo County School Corp. students who are not up-to-date on immunizations will be excluded, district officials said Friday.
Letters have gone out this week informing families that students must have up-to-date immunizations as required by law or they will be excluded.
"It's the final step in a year-long effort to bring students in compliance with state law," said Ray Azar, director of student services. District nurses and other school staff have worked with families throughout the school year through letters, phone calls, home visits and meetings.
"We feel this is our last resort to send out letters and set an exclusion date," Azar said. He estimated that as of Friday, less than 50 students district-wide were not in compliance.
"Our hope is that no student will be excluded from school," he said. If an appointment has been set up to obtain a needed vaccination, students will not be excluded. "We work with them if they have an appointment," Azar said.
Students who have documented religious or medical exemptions are counted as being compliant, based on state law. If an outbreak occurred at a school, such as for measles, those not vaccinated for it would be immediately excluded until the incubation period is over for the last diagnosed case. “It’s for their own protection,” to keep them from getting the measles and passing it to others, Carol Lucas, chairwoman of health and nursing services, said in a recent interview.
The process of setting a deadline to comply with immunizations or face exclusion occurs every year, Lucas said Friday. But because of the measles epidemic occurring throughout the country, "It's getting more press" this year.
Right after Christmas vacation, the district began excluding students at the high school level — one school at a time — and then at the middle school level. Usually, just a handful of students are affected, and sometimes no students at a school are affected.
Typically, students obtain the required immunizations in “a very, very short time,” so they can return to school, Lucas said previously. Both the Sycamore Nursing Center and Vigo County Health Department provide vaccinations to children who are on Medicaid, who lack insurance or whose insurance does not cover immunizations.
In some cases, families just need to provide documentation that children have been vaccinated, Lucas said.