I would like to voice my opposition to compulsory measures to require the COVID-19 vaccine for both students and staff, this vaccine should be encouraged but not mandated. I have personally been vaccinated but there are many reasons why I don't think it should be mandated which include:

1. There are known risks associated with these vaccines including Myocarditis and blood clots. The vaccine manufacturer has been shielded from any liability of any injuries from the vaccine and the US Government doesn't include the COVID-19 vaccines in the The National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VICP) (a.k.a. "Vaccine Court"). In the case of any injuries by either the student or the staff member they would only be able to attempt to going through the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program which to-date hasn't awarded any injuries and have much less protection, see the following articles: https://www.latimes.com/science/story/2021-08-17/severe-covid-vaccine-injuries-help-federal-vaccine-court, https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/black-hole-covid-vaccine-injury-claims-2021-06-29/. If this is to be mandated, I would expect staff members to provide notice that workers compensation would be potentially used to cover any potential medical problems that ensue.
2. There haven't been any long-term studies conducted to see if there are any long-term health impacts to taking the vaccine. Current vaccines required by the school system are all well-known and have been in use for decades. A brand new mRNA technology is now being used for these vaccines and we haven't yet discovered any unintended long-term side-effects. The FDA has recently rejected booster shots for those younger than 65 due to some of these side-effects and unknown long-term damage that it might cause.
3. We know the COVID-19 vaccine's efficacy wains after 6 months and doesn't prevent the individual from getting COVID after that time, we are seeing more and more break-through cases happening every day. We are now being told that the point of the vaccine isn't to make us never get COVID but instead it allows us to have a very minimal chance of going to the hospital or die from COVID. We already have very well-known statistics of COVID hospitalization and mortality rates and we know that those in the K-12 age range have are 36x less likely to be hospitalized than someone in their 50s and 480x less likely to die, this brings it down to a near 0 chance  (https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/91856). So, what are we trying to protect against?
4. We know those who have recovered from COVID-19 have natural immunity to the virus moving forward. I have a couple of friends who's school-age kids have have gotten COVID, luckily none of them were seriously ill and all quickly recovered. We know these kids (and anyone else who got COVID) have strong anti-bodies from getting infected in the past which makes the need for a vaccine unnecessary. The CDC knows it provides good protection but just doesn't know how long the protection lasts where further studies are needed - those studies should happen. Though, my gut feeling is that the natural immunity will be on-par or better than the protection of the currently approved Pfizer vaccine which wains after 6 months.

With all those considerations I would like to plead that this remain a parent's choice. I have 3 young  boys one of which will be entering school soon, I would like to use my best judgement for this particular matter for which I want to see more long-term studies conducted. At no point should this vaccine be mandated as it doesn't prevent people from getting COVID after 6 months nor does it offer significant improvement in outcomes as those in the K-12 age group are already safe from serious negative outcomes due to well-known statistics. If other parents are concerned for the safety of their child, they can choose to vaccinate their child which will allow them to take a near-0 possibility of hospitalization/death to a nearly impossible event.