Will Penn State require students to get COVID-19 vaccines by fall? Here’s what Eric Barron said
Penn State’s president stopped short of declaring Tuesday that the university would not require students to get vaccinated for COVID-19, but he did intimate the administration believes “heavily incentivizing” the vaccine is a better course right now.
“I would say we’re not ready to make any announcement today, other than the fact it’s easy, you should do it, and we’re incentivizing it, and you will hear more and more about the incentives over the next couple weeks,” university President Eric Barron said during a public faculty senate meeting. “And we will see how it goes from that point and decide whether we need to do more.”
More than 80 colleges and universities across the nation have announced they will require their students, or at least those who live on campus, to be vaccinated against COVID-19 in time for the fall semester. In the Big Ten, only three so far have a vaccine requirement — Maryland (all students), Michigan (on-campus students) and Rutgers (all students).
Some Republican governors — from Florida, Montana, Texas and Utah — have already signed orders banning such requirements. Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf, a Democrat, has so far only encouraged vaccinations for college students.
Penn State has not yet made an official announcement one way or the other, but Barron’s remarks Tuesday offered the most in-depth look yet at the university’s thinking. And, with Barron consistently chafing at a potential mandate and instead emphasizing incentives, it was difficult for attendees to leave with the impression the university intended to follow in Maryland’s or Rutgers’ footsteps, unless as a last resort.
In fact, during a Q&A at the faculty senate meeting, Barron fielded more than one question asking why he felt incentivizing was better than requiring. What fears are beneath reluctance to require vaccination? Is it liability offending anti-vaxxers? Those whose politics make them opposed to vaccination?
“Well, it’s a good question, and there’s probably a lot of factors in there,” Barron replied, pointing out that certain health conditions — such as pregnancy — might make some students hesitant. “So that polarity is definitely a challenge. So we are taking the tack, let’s make it easy. And let’s incentivize it, and let’s see if we can reach a level of herd immunity that changes what the landscape is — and we’ll have to see how it goes.
“And we have time to watch the evolution of this and then we will decide what actions we might have to take.”
According to Barron, the board of trustees would also like to weigh in on the issue. (They next meet May 6-7 and again July 15-16.) Penn State’s president said the university plans to closely follow the number of students who upload their vaccine records into their health portals, before offering a public update in June and knowing by July whether more action must be taken.
At this point, it’s not yet known what the potential incentives might look like. When it comes to incentivizing staff members, Barron casually mentioned a raffle for his parking spot as a possible example. With students, there was mention of “housing and food services” and “getting into stadiums” — but no specifics.
When asked Wednesday whether the university was considering opening football and basketball student sections to only those who were vaccinated, a university spokesperson emphasized that it was “too early” to answer many of the CDT’s follow-up questions.
“A variety of areas are being discussed and a number of incentives are under consideration,” spokesperson Rachel Pell said in an email.
Barron said Penn State’s first goal, when it came to vaccinations, was to simply make sure they were readily available to the university community. And he believed the university succeeded.
By partnering with state/local organizations, and even businesses such as Walmart, the university president hoped every student who wanted a vaccine would be able to get one. And, even outside of University Park, students still have plenty of opportunities: As of noon Wednesday, nearly 50 appointment times were still available for the rest of Wednesday, within a 5-mile radius of campus.
“I am hoping that by making it easy and incentivizing and having the significance of the incentives grow that, through time, this will create an environment — especially as more and more data is available — that will create an overwhelming population that realizes the significance of it,” Barron added.
In the fall, per the university’s COVID-19 dashboard, more than 5,000 University Park students were diagnosed with the coronavirus out of about 87,000 tests. Since Dec. 19, that number has essentially been halved (2,579) despite more tests (91,913). Weekly cases have also fallen, to 134 over the last seven days compared to their peak of 694 last semester from Sept. 18-24.
“We know this works, and we know this is incredibly important,” Barron said, referring to the COVID-19 vaccine. “So I encourage — and we will incentivize everything we can — to move forward.”
This story was originally published April 29, 2021 at 7:00 AM with the headline "Will Penn State require students to get COVID-19 vaccines by fall? Here’s what Eric Barron said."
