Tucson Standard

During its May 9 meeting, the Tucson Unified School District (TUSD) discussed and made changes to the district's vaccine, health and safety, and mask protocols.

The board discussed changes that have been made to the district's immunization policy against measles. Michael Areinoff, TUSD's associate general counsel, told the board that all employees of the district, including substitutes, must provide evidence of immunization or immunity against both the rubeola and rubella strains of measles either by proof of vaccination or proof of having contracted the virus in their life. For the rubeola-specific strain, those born before 1957 are considered immune.

Employees can be exempted for medical or religious reasons, but in the case of a major outbreak, they may be placed on leave by the district; Areinoff added.

The board also approved a staff health and safety policy for communicable diseases—which essentially involved removing a list of communicable diseases that were required to immediately be reported to the Arizona Department of Health—as a way to keep the district's policies as flexible and updated as possible, Areinoff said. The changes were recommended by district counsel and committee members.

Areinoff also suggested ending the district's COVID-19 mandates. Though TUSD did not have a vaccination mandate, unvaccinated people were required to be tested. He told the board that policy was no longer necessary.

“At this point, the recommendation from the Communicable Disease Task Force was to simply retire this policy," he said in the meeting. "I think we did borrow some of the language at the beginning and put it into the GBGCA, but the rest of it, in light of I think where we are today and with COVID-19, the rest of it was recommended to simply retire."

The board voted to approve the changes and end the COVID-19 policy, but only after 30 days of public notice.