More than 600 faculty and staff from University of Minnesota campuses have signed a letter to President Joan Gabel, raising several concerns about current COVID-19 protocols.

Faculty and staff claim the vaccine mandate is “toothless” for students, as they are lacking transparency on COVID cases and vaccination numbers.

"We don't want the narrative to be that this is a student 'individual responsibility issue. This is really about the responsibility of the university to keep us all as safe as possible," Andrea Sande, staff member and president of the staff union of UMD said.

Sande signed the letter to Gable.

She said students are not required to take a picture of their vaccination card and only provide vaccine information on an online form.

The form only asks what kind of vaccine a student received with the dates of their doses.

"Are they actually vaccinated? Did they just say they were vaccinated? I think it really is dangerous from a public health perspective to have what is potentially completely inaccurate information," Sande said.

UMD writing studies Professor, Liz Wright, claimed there is not enough testing or contact tracing measures.

"The dashboard says there are very few cases because these are only reported from the health center or those that self-report," Wright said.

UMD Public Relations and Marketing Director, Lynne Williams said they are following system-wide protocols, and there are more complicated, individual factors to consider for each person.

"We ask them to be very cognizant of being respectful of their health and the health of others and following these protocols. At the end of the day, it is private healthcare insurance and again it is a bit of a trust factor," Williams said.

Williams said she is not aware of any disciplinary actions for faculty and staff for not following protocols. Students receive a hold on their account for the spring semester.

To see the full faculty letter, follow this link to the KBJR-TV website. https://kbjr6.com/2021/09/23/umd-faculty-and-staff-call-vaccine-mandate-toothless-call-for-change-to...