Over 1,300 employees from all school districts in Marin County received their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine at the Marin Civic Center on Jan. 17, 10 months after the Tamalpais Unified High School District initially went into distance learning. However, Marin County has since rolled back the availability of vaccines in the wake of the California Department of Public Health’s Jan. 22 decision to prioritize vaccinations according to age.

 “The county has to prioritize 75 and older right now and we are told that they will then begin to prioritize educators again. So we are in a holding pattern and have not been given an updated time frame other than we are still in cue but things have shifted,” Tam Assistant Principal Kaki McLachlan said.

According to an email sent to all Tam teachers and staff on Jan. 14, Marin County had created a four-tiered system to determine the order of the vaccination process, beginning with food service workers and educators providing in-person instruction. TUHSD employees had begun receiving vaccinations beginning in Tier 1, starting with those who had a close proximity to students like employees working in the administration.

This plan was halted, however, and as of Jan. 22, only people aged 75 or older will be eligible to receive a vaccine, according to Marin County’s public health website. The change in distribution order was forced by the limited availability of COVID-19 vaccines leading to California Governor Gavin Newsom’s decision. Newsom and the state of California released the new recommendations, which counties are expected, but not required, to follow.

“We don’t have the doses for that … we have to have a more refined strategy to focus on a smaller group, and this is by far the most logical approach based on mortality [rates],” Marin County Public Health Officer Dr. Matt Willis said in an interview with The Mercury News. 

Tam and other Marin schools are still waiting for updated timelines on when more staff members could be vaccinated and this uncertainty has been hard on teachers. 

“I was not able to get the vaccine. They had started vaccinating the first tier of teachers and then I heard this process stopped abruptly because the state is considering getting rid of prioritizing teachers altogether and just focusing on people in higher age groups. I still don’t know what’s going on, and honestly, it’s causing a lot of anxiety because no one seems to have any answers,” history teacher Jennifer Dolan said.

The eventual distribution of vaccines will not affect the return to in-person learning according to McLachlan. “We remain closed to in-person instruction because of state restrictions and guidelines … So, unless the state updates their guidelines, which is never out of the question, we will need to wait until we return to the Red Tier to open for in-person instruction,” McLachlan said.