Good morning and welcome the kid news. I'm Tori. It's Tuesday, January 4th, 2022, our

first podcast of the new year. And we begin with the FDA giving the go ahead for 12 to

15 year olds in the U.S. to get the Pfizer booster. The news came down yesterday morning.

Now it's up to the CDC to make it official. In the meantime, it's back to school today

for some, but for others, the return to the classroom has been postponed. A big part of

the reason is the latest COVID variant called Omicron, which seems to be highly contagious,

even though it appears it doesn't make people who get it quite as sick as other strains.

For example, Milwaukee, which is about 71,000 students, has decided to start classes remotely

today because so many teachers have tested positive for the virus. Also, Baltimore and Washington

DC are extending winter break by two days. According to the Wall Street Journal, school

superintendents are weighing when and how to reopen, and a big factor in making that decision

is the availability of tests in their area. But many agree that students learn best with teachers

in the classroom, so the priority is to resume in-person learning as safely as possible.

A couple good deeds to highlight in the new year. Over a dozen people in Washington

state spent their Christmas Eve helping a group of elk escape from a frozen river.

Twelve of the animals had plunged through the ice in Barstow, and the volunteers used

kayaks plus a four-by-four truck and plenty of rope to help bring the animals safely to the shore.

Meanwhile, an Eden Prairie Minnesota 15-year-old Sydney Rayleigh was working her regular

lunch shift at a McDonald's when she noticed a customer choking on a chicken nugget in her car.

Sydney jumped through the drive-through window and started doing the Heimlich maneuver,

a life-saving move she learned during a Red Cross babysitter class. Two police officers

who've been called to the scene gave the teen a hundred dollars from a fun they use for people

...