The University of St. Thomas will require all employees, including student employees, to be vaccinated by January 4, 2022, in compliance with federal guidelines instated by the Biden administration.

Until this point, St. Thomas has been able to make its own rules regarding what is best for the community, but now the university will have to comply with federal guidelines. There will be a new exemption process that follows those guidelines, and St. Thomas will work with employees who may seek exemption for medical or religious reasons.

“Under our new process, the only two reasons for exemption is medical reason, which has to be documented by your provider, or a sincerely held religious belief and would go through a series of questions for you to answer to indicate that that’s a sincerely held religious belief, and that form would be notarized,” university President Julie Sullivan said at a UART Virtual Office Hour – Zoom event on Oct. 27.

The new federal mandate requires all employees be vaccinated, regardless of where they work – even if they are entirely remote. Unvaccinated individuals who receive an exemption will need to continue wearing masks and practice social distancing.

The conscientious reasons exemption, which was originally offered by St. Thomas, will no longer be offered under the federal exemption process for employees.

“People who have that exemption right now will need to either be vaccinated or they will need to be approved for a religious exemption or a medical exemption,” the associate general counsel Abigail Crouse said.

In accordance with the federal requirement, employees must be fully vaccinated, meaning they have either both doses of a two dose series or the single dose of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine. As of now, the requirement does not include a booster shot. The consequences for employees who fail to receive a vaccine or an exemption are not yet known.

Vaccination statuses of students and employees are currently kept at St. Thomas’ Center of Well-Being, but will be transferred over to Human Resources. This process will require employees to sign to release information and automatically share vaccinations status records to St. Thomas HR.

Vice Provost for Academic Affairs Wendy Wyatt says that the university will work with student employees to be sure that they are in compliance with the new guidance.

“We did ask students to request exemptions or get their shots for this semester, and we told them that that would be valid for this semester so we’ll be working with student employees to comply as well,” Wyatt said.

Wyatt also said that the university will focus on full-time employees getting in compliance before moving on to student employees.

St. Thomas is not the only institution grappling with this process. The new OSHA rule is working to further expand the number of colleges subject to the federal mandate.

Camarae Good can be reached at good4796@stthomas.edu