Education
Kindergarten Immunizations Low at Royle, Ox Ridge Schools, Wide Variations Across Town
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Kindergarten children at Royle and Ox Ridge schools in Darien had so many exemptions to state student vaccination requirements in the last school year that the schools are among 134 across the state that fall below the recommended 95% rate. At Royle School, the vaccination rate was only 92.6%; at Ox Ridge, 94.7%, according to data for the 2018-2019 school year just released by the state Department of Public Health. Hindley was the only other school in town with some parents who didn’t have their children vaccinated, and there the rate was 98.7% vaccinating. The rate was 100% at Tokeneke and Holmes schools. The percentage of Kindergarteners with medical or religious exemptions exactly tracks the vaccination rate in Darien schools: add up the vaccination percentage and the exemption percentage, and you get to 100% of kindergarteners in each of the town’s five schools.