93-3-3-WMR Audio on Demand presents the Preston and Steve show podcast.

And now, Preston and Steve's news update with Kathy Romano.

Today's Wednesday, August 25th. Good morning, Kathy.

Good morning in the news this morning.

The Philadelphia School Board voted unanimously Tuesday night to mandate that

its 20,000 teachers and staff members be vaccinated against COVID-19, but details of when the

mandate would go into place are still being worked out, school district officials said.

The move comes as other state and local mandates for teacher vaccinations are being put in place,

including New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy's mandate Monday, that teachers and school staff statewide be vaccinated by October 18th or submit to regular testing. New York

public schools also issued a no-option vaccination mandate for the city's 148,000 public school

teachers and staff Monday. Details for the Philadelphia school mandate are still being worked out

with the union that represents teachers and other school employees.

Board members and student ambassadors asked if the students in a classroom will know if their teacher has been vaccinated.

Acting Philadelphia Health Commissioner Cheryl Bedegal, who attended the virtual board meeting, said that information would be protected under health privacy laws.

Unlike New Jersey, the Philadelphia resolution, as presented, did not allow teachers to opt out

of vaccination for other reasons. Philadelphia schools will reopen next week. And for many of

these districts, 120,000 students, it will be the first time that they have attended in-person

classes since 18 months ago when the city first announced

the COVID-19 lockdowns. The district has been preparing for the return of students, August 31st,

announcing a mask mandate for students and staff earlier this summer and a weekly testing regimen

for staff as well as twice weekly testing for students in competitive sports and other

activities. When I was hearing this story and I was, you know, oh, the kids are returning to school. I'm like, oh man, isn't that early? And I'm like, no, it's not. Where did the summer go? We're crying out loud. It is early. Most schools are going back before Labor Day. The past couple of years, most of the schools, a lot of the schools went back after Labor Day.

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