January 27, 2021 – Nevada County public and private school teachers are getting vaccinated thanks to a collaboration between the Superintendent of Schools and Nevada County Public Health. Today was the first day of the three-day clinic and and 14 nurses will administer 1,004 doses during the event.
Nevada County Superintendent of Schools Scott Lay was in the NU gymnasium, transformed into a vaccine clinic, complete with a monitoring area for the newly vaccinated teachers.
“This clinic is available to all public and private school teachers in Nevada County who want to get vaccinated. We were also able to secure doses for long-term substitute teachers,” Lay said. “We’ve been working in collaboration with the [Nevada County] Public Health Department, they’ve been fantastic. They understand the importance of getting our educators vaccinated to get our kids back in school, to get our community back to where it was in early March. Nevada Union High School gave their gym and their staff to us, great help in putting this together and I really thank them.
“We knew, looking at the sectors of our economy, that teachers were really important. We got a shipment of the Pfizer vaccine, meaning we have to give the doses within a certain timeframe [due to the super cold storage requirements.] One of our public health nurses, who has been our liaison to the schools throughout this pandemic, with testing, contact tracing and prevention of COVID in the schools and has done an amazing job with that reached out to one of the school nurses here at NU. She asked, do you think we can do this? The two of them organized all this in less than a week,” a Nevada County Public Health spokesperson said, pointing at the bustling gym.
Photo YubaNet 
Photo YubaNet
Nine school nurses and five Public Health nurses were busy collecting the information that has to be reported back to the state within 24 hours, answer questions, administer the vaccine and finally monitor for any reaction.
Lay said approximately 70% of teachers in Nevada County signed up when offered the opportunity. Vaccination for teachers are voluntary only, there is no mandate. He stated the collaboration between Public Health and his office appears to be a first in the state.