After welcoming our 1,500 elementary students back to our three campuses, it quickly became clear that a vaccine mandate for staff was the only way to provide a stable learning environment, especially because our students are too young to be vaccinated. So on Sept. 1, we announced a policy that all employees of Rocketship Public Schools, D.C. must be fully vaccinated against the coronavirus by Oct. 29. Employees who choose not to get vaccinated and don’t receive a Rocketship-approved exemption will no longer work at Rocketship as of Oct. 30.