COVID-19 vaccine update for Wellesley seniors & veterans

January 27, 2021 by admin 5 Comments

From the Wellesley Council on Aging:

We have important update for all Wellesley Seniors who are 75 and older. The State has opened up scheduling starting today for vaccinations beginning next week. There is a high volume of registrants expected and an unknown number of current appointments available. While everyone will get an appointment to be vaccinated, please be patient as it may take a few times to get an appointment scheduled. We are working closely with the Health Department to stay apprised. The Health Department is working on setting up an in town clinic in the upcoming weeks and we will disseminate more info as it becomes available. We are bringing volunteers up to speed on how to assist with scheduling of appointments. It is our understanding that the process could easily take upwards of 20 minutes or more per person. To sign-up, you must have your date of birth, insurance information (if you have it), and answer some health questions and agree to an attestation. Our volunteers will make as many calls as they can today and be calling people back from their home phones identifying themselves as a Wellesley COA volunteer. If you would like to have a volunteer return your call and register you online or help you with questions, please call us at (781) 235-3961, we will ask you a few questions and take down your contact information. If you are a veteran, please contact Nancy, the Veteran Service Agent, for vaccinations through the VA at (781) 489-7509.

We hope to be putting out more information, including screen shots and instructions on how to register at home on your own later today.

Thank you for your patience and assistance.

Heather M. Munroe, Director of Senior Services
(781) 235-3961

Wellesley health officials frustrated with limited vaccine role; schools to discuss COVID-19 dashboard update

January 25, 2021 by Bob Brown 3 Comments

Word that the Commonwealth intends to rely mainly on regional COVID-19 vaccination centers and partnerships with commercial distributors like CVS for inoculations during Phase 2 of the state’s rollout plan has Wellesley’s Health Department and Board of Health grappling with what their role will be in all this. Phase 2 of the rollout starts Feb. 1 for the state, which as administered nearly 450,000 COVID-19 vaccine doses to date.

The Health Department successfully vaccinated first responders and town health employees earlier this month beginning on the first day it got the Moderna vaccine, but opportunities for the town to vaccinate seniors, teachers, or others is starting to look less likely, based on discussion that took place Monday during the Board of Health’s meeting, which included Wellesley School Committee and Wellesley Public School reps.

Their meeting was held just prior to Gov. Charlie Baker sharing the state’s latest vaccination numbers and plans, which included bumping teachers down a smidge on the vaccination priority list. Board of Health Vice Chair Dr. Marcia Testa Simonson was joining the meeting straight from a call with other high-level health officials, so had the skinny on what the governor was slated to announcement during his briefing, and the health department was going to be back on a call with the Massachusetts Department of Public Health at the end of the day.

New information on vaccines is coming fast and furious, and vaccines were the topic of the day for the health and school officials. It has been top of mind for residents as well, according to Health Director Lenny Izzo.

“We’re getting a lot of emails, we’re getting a lot of criticism and comments around the vaccine rollout, a lot of remarks that we’re essentially hoarding or not sharing the vaccine, or opening up public clinics the way we should be,” he said. “The bottom line is just don’t have the vaccine.”

At the earliest, the town will get more vaccine mid-next week, he said, and at the most, the town will be able to request 100 doses per week, which it plans to do.

“The ball is in the state’s court right now,” Board of Health Chair Shep Cohen added.

Cities and towns across the state are receiving public health trust fund money and some have already hired people to do vaccinations, though now will perhaps have those people handle testing instead, Testa Simonson said.

It’s unclear at this point how the town or state will handle vaccines for homebound residents who may have great difficulty getting to a regional vaccination center, such as Gillette Stadium in Foxborough. The town is getting plenty of calls from its senior residents who are figuring town health personnel might be swinging by with vaccines for them, even though that isn’t likely how things will work.

Testa Simonson said that one role for local public health entities could be helping people schedule their vaccines, maybe even by setting up a call center to help people navigate the system. Perhaps the Council on Aging could also play a role in this, and helping to get people to where they need to go for vaccinations, board members said.

It’s unclear whether the CVS on Rte. 9 east in Wellesley will be a COVID-19 vaccination site, but Board of Health member Linda Oliver Grape noted that it does have a nice setup there that could accommodate such activity. The site already provides COVID-19 testing.

“We’ll see what happens,” Izzo said, about the overall vaccine plan. “[The state] always seems to change course.”

Wellesley Public Schools update

Upon hearing the state’s latest vaccine distribution plans, Wellesley Public Schools Supt. Dr. David Lussier said “I’m shocked that they’re not trying to leverage local resources to get this done.” Vaccinations for staff are the highest priority for school districts everywhere, he said: “That’s really going to be a catalyst for other things we may be able to do before the end of this school year.”

Lussier expressed surprise that teachers would be bumped down (even if only slightly) on the state’s priority list in light of the governor’s push to get more kids back in physical schools. “I had hoped we could develop a partnership, a local solution that would allow our staff to be vaccinated here in the community in which they work,” he said.

The logistics of getting teachers and staff to mass vaccination sites during the school day would be challenging, and a much less nimble solution than handling things locally, Lussier said. A professional organization for superintendents to which he belongs sent a letter to the governor last week strongly encouraging him to be thinking of February vacation as a good opportunity to get teachers vaccinated. Though as Board of Health members noted, that could be tough time-wise given that there are some big groups ahead of teachers on the schedule.

Lussier posed the question of whether it might behoove the town to approach an outfit like CVS to get a vaccination plan in place for when it is the teachers’ turn.

Separately, Lussier gave an update regarding COVID-19-related efforts at the school system. He made reference to a new state program to support pool testing at schools, but that solution is more labor intensive than the one Wellesley has already been using, so not attractive to Wellesley Public Schools. Lussier is hoping that perhaps state funding might be available to WPS even though it is not using a state-approved vendor or model. WPS is shifting from private to local funding to support its viral testing program, so state relief would be more than welcome.

The school system will also be hosting a webinar on Thursday, Jan. 28 at 6:30-8pm to discuss its plans to update the Wellesley Public Reopening Measures dashboard, which health and school representatives have been working to revise in light of new knowledge about the virus and its spread. Web links will be shared soon.

Wellesley COVID-19 cases booming

Ann Marie McCauley, the town’s public health nurse supervisor, said Wellesley is getting a lot of COVID-19 cases these days. She cited 20 new ones over the weekend and 16 more Monday morning, with Babson College numbers booming upon the return of students from their winter break.

Wellesley has largely been handling contact tracing for COVID-19 cases on its own, but the higher numbers have resulted in the town sending more to the state’s Community Tracing Collaborative.

As for vaccines, the town held two clinics last week, dispensing first-round doses to first responders and school nurses.

Wellesley High back to hybrid learning; schools tightening budget belts due to COVID

January 21, 2021 by Deborah Brown Leave a Comment

Wellesley High School returned to a hybrid model of education on Tuesday, after students spent a week learning remotely due to an increase in positive COVID-19 test results. Data located on the district’s COVID dashboard reflects that in the date range of Jan. 8 – Jan. 21 there were 22 positive tests in the public school system, with the highest number during that time (10) coming from WHS. The high numbers caused a shift at the high school to full remote learning.

Wellesley High School, fall 2020

Superintendent David Lussier during the Jan. 12 School Committee meeting said the data is essential in allowing the district to take “targeted actions that might be appropriate at one school that really aren’t warranted at other schools. While we never want to see schools closed, period, the fact that we’re able to target this for one school at a particular time speaks to how much we’ve learned.”

Some parents, however, are concerned about the impact of remote learning on the quality of education that is delivered, and the impact of remote learning on students’ mental health. A letter about this was signed by hundreds of parents and sent to school and other town officials.

The upshot: a large number of parents want their kids back in school full time.

The school and health departments are reworking the public schools reopening measures dashboard, whose underlying measures need to be updated in light of new data from the town and beyond regarding COVID-19. Currently, Wellesley Public Schools are failing all three measures highlighted in the dashboard.

Our take: we’d like to be wrong on this, but in reading between the lines, it seems unlikely that there will be a return to full-time school across grade levels for the rest of the year. Though the vaccine could allow some changes.

Why students aren’t back in school full-time

In an effort to manage expectations while addressing parent concerns, Lussier said that the overarching goal has been to “bring back students within grade levels who have exceptional needs, whose needs can’t be met adequately through remote learning.”

Additional prioritized students are those in Pre-K, K, and grades 1 and 2. Those students are back in school four days per week. Wednesday, traditionally a half-day for Wellesley’s elementary school students, is a remote learning half-day.

The biggest consideration on bringing back the rest of the grades centers around social distancing. The WPS have in place a a 6-feet social distance standard, which is in keeping with the Centers for Disease Control standard.

“We believe that standard needs to stay in place for now” to prevent in school transmission, Lussier said. In addition, “We don’t have anymore spaces to be bringing back any more whole grade levels.”

Lussier also cited as concerns the increased need for contact tracing that would result should additional whole grades be brought back into the schools; lunch-time, with its no-mask environment; and bus transportation needs for K – grade 6 students who live over two miles from school. By state law, the district must provide transportation to those students.

School budget, FY2022

Under guidelines the School Committee received from the Select Board, there is to be an increase in the FY22 budget of no more than 2.5%. “That’s quite slim,” said Linda Chow, “but certainly a reflection on the times we’re in and the impact of COVID on town finances.”

In FY2021, Town Meeting voted to appropriate $80,379,651 to the schools. A 2.5% increase would boost the FY22 schools budget by a little over $2 million.

The budget will be strictly a service-level affair, the goal being to hang onto all educational programming at the level at which it now operates at the very least. There will be no expected investments in new programs. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that all current programming is safe from potential cuts.

One line item that can substantially fluctuate upward: the money set aside for special education needs. The FY22 budget currently is based on the town’s known special education needs, but variables are always possible. “The budget is based on only the known costs we have in special education, or that can be reasonably anticipated,” Lussier said.

Level services may also need to include additional student interventions to close education gaps created by the pandemic.

Wellesley schools, FY22 Budget

Upcoming meetings:

Jan. 26: School Committee meeting
Watch School Committee Meetings online at wellesleymedia.org
Comcast 8 & 9
Verizon 39 & 40

Feb. 2: School Committee meeting and public hearing. The community is invited to ask specific questions and make comments during this meeting.

Feb. 9: School Committee votes on the budget

Mar. 3: Advisory Committee will review the SC budget

Apr./May 2021: Town Meeting

Wellesley Health Department social workers offering residents a group online chat

January 16, 2021 by Bob Brown Leave a Comment

In light of recent attack on the U.S. Capitol and continued stress caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the Wellesley Health Department is hosting an online chat via Zoom with its social workers, who will be there to listen and share tips for self-care. The event, which could become a regular thing if there’s interest, takes place on Thursday, Jan. 28 from 1-2 p.m.

To register, please email your name and phone number to Senior Community Social Worker Joyce Saret at [email protected]

Thank you Swellesley Report supporters & on to Year Sweet 16

Wellesley vaccinates first responders against COVID-19

January 11, 2021 by Deborah Brown Leave a Comment

Wellesley’s Health Department, armed with doses of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine, set up shop on Monday at Fire Department Headquarters on Route 9 to vaccinate first responders.

First up were firefighters Joanie Cullinan and Brian Hester, both of whom have faced serious health situations. Cullinan has recovered from Stage 3 Melanoma and become an effective advocate for occupational cancer awareness. Hester, a firefighter since 2002, became sick with COVID-19 in the spring and did a grand tour of local health facilities over 10 weeks fighting off the respiratory disease. Feeling lucky to be at the vaccine clinic, Hester said he is still dealing with after-effects from COVID-19 but hopes to return to work sooner than later.

ff vaccines wellesley — Firefighter Brian Hester keeps his eye on the needle

This was no private doctor’s office visit. The firefighters, in familiar surroundings at the firehouse, received their vaccinations with bemused expressions as camera crews from local TV news stations captured the whole thing for posterity.

Hester said getting the shot was no problem. “I didn’t feel a thing,” he quipped.

#Wellesley vaccinates first responders against #COVID19 https://t.co/AZ9HcGiz19 #vaccines @moderna_tx @WellesleyFire pic.twitter.com/y0ib8yEqA1

— swellesley (@swellesley) January 12, 2021

Cullinan is still going in for screenings in the aftermath of her cancer treatments, but is back to work and feeling strong. She refers to herself as “a professional patient at this point,” and says getting the vaccine made this a good day, allowing firefighters “to protect our families and keep everyone else safe.”

When asked for her message to other first responders about getting the vaccine, she said “everybody’s got to do what’s right for them,” but that it was the right choice for her, her family, and colleagues. Naturally, some of those colleagues headed out on a call when we were there, sirens blaring upon their departure.

Three other Wellesley firefighters and five Wellesley police officers were also vaccinated, with more set to receive shots later this week.

Health Department Director Lenny Izzo, who was on site, said “we’re prepared, we’re ready for this.” He and the rest of the staff have spent recent weeks working out the various challenges that the town faces in administering the vaccine, including the transport and cold storage of it, as well as scheduling injections. While much has been made of storage challenges, he says the town has had no issue handling that end of things.

Izzo told us during a recent interview that vaccines will be dispensed in a staggered process, to ensure that not too many first responders could potentially suffer bad reactions at once.

For this first round, health officials received 100 vials of the Moderna vaccine and expect another allocation within a week to complete the first responder vaccinations. Ann Marie McCauley, the town’s public health nurse supervisor, said during Monday’s Board of Health meeting that the Health Department plans to use every drop of vaccine during six clinics over the course of this week, and still won’t have enough for all first responders.

First responders, along with healthcare workers and those in nursing homes and assisted living facilities are among those designated by the state to be vaccinated at the start.

Thank you Swellesley Report supporters & on to Year Sweet 16

Rise in COVID-19 cases forces Wellesley High back to all-remote

January 8, 2021 by Bob Brown 2 Comments

Wellesley High School Wellesley Public School and town health officials feared that the return from the holiday break could result in a rise in COVID-19 cases. Speculation was swirling among parents that a return to full-remote could be in the offing even as they urged the Health and School Department to renew efforts to update COVID-19 dashboard metrics and bring students back to full in-person learning.

Unfortunately, fears that a spike in cases would happen has been realized, and WPS is failing two of its three COVID-19 dashboard metrics, a trigger to reevaluate the educational model in use. Wellesley High School will return to all-remote education on Jan. 11, with a planned return to hybrid schooling on Jan. 19. This means that the winter athletic season has also been put on hold (no practices, games or competitions until Jan. 19 at the earliest).

The School Department briefed the School Committee shortly before Christmas on the successes of its viral testing program, and the funding status of it. One key marketing point by those touting it is that the program has allowed the school system to close down schools in a targeted way, as it is now doing with the high school.

Here’s what Wellesley Public Schools Supt. David Lussier and Health Department Director Lenny Izzo shared in a Friday night memo:

Dear Members of the Wellesley Public Schools Community,

We write to provide you with an update on Covid-19 in WPS this week. We saw positive cases at multiple schools, including single cases at Bates and Upham, two cases at Sprague, and five cases at WMS. All but two of these cases are students. None of these cases involved in-school transmission of the virus.

Our most challenging situation is at Wellesley High School where we documented 10 positive cases this week. All but one of these cases are students. Two of these cases may have emerged through in-classroom transmission, although we cannot confirm that with full certainty. (We will be conducting a more thorough review next week.) The aggregated number of close contacts and other absences has resulted in a significant number of students and staff who cannot attend school in person. We are particularly concerned that we do not have enough staff to safely open the school next week.

After a careful review of all of these facts, the School Department and Health Department have jointly determined that Wellesley High School will transition to full remote learning on Monday, January 11th, with a planned return to hybrid learning on Tuesday, January 19th. All WHS winter sports will be on hold during this time and may also resume on January 19th.

It is absolutely critical that our entire school community work together and adhere to the safety protocols of wearing masks, social distancing, frequent hand-washing, and avoiding large group gatherings. It is particularly important that we support our students in doing this anytime they are outside of their homes.

We recognize that this is disappointing news given all of our safety efforts, but we also believe strongly that this response is both appropriate and targeted based on the information we have collected. All other WPS schools will continue to follow their regular hybrid schedules next week.

Thank you for your ongoing efforts to keep our entire community safe.

Dr. David Lussier

Superintendent of Schools

Leonard Izzo

Director, Wellesley Health Department

Thank you Swellesley Report supporters & on to Year Sweet 16

Wellesley teens make Warren Park playground sensory friendly

January 6, 2021 by Bob Brown 1 Comment

It wasn’t long ago when playgrounds across Wellesley were off limits, surrounded by orange plastic fencing or other materials aimed at preventing kids from spreading COVID-19 on swings, slides, and in sandboxes. Now with concerns lessened about the disease being transmitted via surfaces, playgrounds are back in action, and not only that, Wellesley has new equipment at Warren Park that is all about being touched and encouraging sensory play.

“It seemed like it belonged there the whole time,” Natural Resources Commission (NRC) Director Brandon Schmitt told the Wellesley Community Preservation Committee (CPC) during a meeting in December, shortly after the equipment at the 90 Washington St., playground outside the Recreation Center was installed.

music store equipment at warren park — Photo courtesy of Sam Beuker

The colorful new Cozy Cocoon and Music Store equipment are the result of efforts by Jake Merritt, a Wellesley High School senior,, and Alex Battle Abdelal, a senior at Noble and Greenough School.

The friends came to be interested in making a Wellesley playground sensory-friendly through different paths.

Merritt had begun volunteering with a program in Boston called Teens Engaged as Mentors that provides social outings and leadership opportunities for kids. “Seeing the positive effects of that program and the community that was built around it inspired me to begin looking at how I could help kids with autism within my own community,” he says.

Abdelal traces his interest in the subject a few years back when he was performing in the play “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time,” in which the lead character is boy on the autism spectrum.

“Because of this, I had been immersed in research related to autism studies for months,” he says. “The play—and researching for my performance in it—showed me the need for inclusive spaces that honor neurodiversity.

“[Jake and I] found ourselves talking about the subject and learning about it together, and we came across this rather new invention of ‘sensory-friendly parks,'” Abdelal says.

Their research found that the nearest sensory-friendly playground to Wellesley was more than an hour away.

“Alex and I saw an opportunity to provide a more inclusive experience to not just people in Wellesley, but hopefully for people in surrounding towns hoping to find more inclusive playgrounds,” Merritt says.

The young men initially planned to raise $10K and add the playground equipment as a gift to the town. During the planning process to raise funds, they came in contact with the NRC’s Schmitt, who they say took a great interest in the project and helped them learn about ways to get town funding.

The process took about a year, between finding a company to make and install the equipment, and presenting before numerous town boards and committees, including the NRC, Design Review Board and CPC.

The proposal was refined as a result of the CPC meeting. “Some of the parts were taken away, some were added, and the budget was adjusted to $12,000,” Merritt says.

Cozy Cocoon and Music Store

Taking a closer look at the new equipment, the Cozy Cocoon serves a couple of functions, according to Merritt.

cozy cocoon playground equipment — Photo courtesy of Sam Beuker

“First of all, it is a place a child might go if over-stimulated. Sometimes it helps to escape the hustle and bustle of the playground, and the Cozy Cocoon helps with that,” he says. “Second, the Cocoon is lined with a number of different textures. This offers an opportunity for tactical exploration, which is good for all kids, not just those on the Autism Spectrum.”

The Cozy Cocoon complements the other new equipment, dubbed the Music Store, which adds a splash of color to the otherwise subdued tones of the Warren Park playground. It encourages tactile exploration, with a variety of instruments, including drums and bells. “The Music Store incorporates another sense, our sense of hearing, into the playground experience through the various instruments.,” Merritt says.

music store equipment at warren park playground — Photo courtesy of Sam Beuker

Merritt and Abdelal have talked about expanding the project to other Wellesley playgrounds, including at elementary schools, but there are no formal plans. For now though, Wellesley is fortunate to have some of the only outdoor equipment of its kind in the area.

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