Improving Campus Health—Building on Research to Increase Vaccination Rates

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College campuses are ripe for the spread of infectious diseases. But many students haven't received all recommended vaccines, making robust vaccination programs critical for higher education institutions. 

In a recent brief, experts from Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s (CHOP) PolicyLab and Vaccine Education Center (VEC) reviewed the challenges college health administrators face when addressing vaccination rates on campuses. The brief highlights best practices and includes recommendations to help administrators strengthen vaccination programs, ultimately improving the health of both the campus population and the local community.

This analysis and related recommendations can inform discussions among administrators, students, researchers, and policy experts looking to unpack the barriers to implementing immunization guidelines and serve as a framework for exploring solutions to strengthen vaccine uptake among students.

On March 14, 2024, PolicyLab and CHOP’s Vaccine Education Center hosted a virtual conversation titled, “Improving Campus Health—Building on Research to Increase Vaccination Rates,” with adolescent and young adult health, vaccine, and policy experts who discussed the challenges college health administrators face when addressing vaccination rates on campuses, what on-the-ground implementation of these recommendations looks like for administrators, and how researchers, students, college health administrators, and others can partner to strengthen vaccine uptake among college students.

Panelists included:

  • Kristen A. Feemster, MD, MPH, MSHPR, FAAP, faculty scholar at PolicyLab, director of research for the VEC, and executive director of global medical and scientific affairs for pneumococcal vaccines at Merck

  • Ashlee Halbritter, MPH, executive director of Public Health and Well-being at the University of Pennsylvania

  • Jonathan Pletcher, MD, medical director of inpatient services for the Craig-Dalsimer Division of Adolescent Medicine at CHOP, and associate professor at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania

  • Samantha Ratner, founder of Know Your Vaccines, head of the Student Vaccine Working Group on Ethics and Policy, and clinical research assistant in the department of Clinical Genetics at Columbia University

  • Charlotte A. Moser, MS, co-director of the VEC and Rebecka Rosenquist, MSc, PolicyLab’s health policy director (moderators)

Authors:

Feemster KA, Halbritter A, Pletcher J, Ratner S, Moser CA, Rosenquist R