Seattle Pacific’s senior leadership council emailed the community on Friday announcing that it would require all returning students to be vaccinated against COVID-19 by August 1.

SPU’s leadership council hopes that by requiring vaccination, campus operations can begin to return to how they were before the pandemic.

“We know getting vaccinated does not completely remove the risk of infection with the COVID-19 virus, but we believe vaccines are a vital piece in moving closer to resuming our normal way of living, working, and teaching here on campus,” the announcement read.

The email says that exemptions will be considered for medical, disability, and religious reasons. As of now SPU employees are not required to be vaccinated, but are strongly encouraged to. The leadership council says that an official decision on employee vaccination requirements will be made after further consultation and review of applicable guidance.

Over the past month, most major Universities in Washington have announced similar vaccine requirements for their students.

Seattle University and Washington State University announced their requirements in April, while University of Washington, Central Washington University, and Western Washigton University announced their requirements earlier this week. Eastern Washigton University bucked the trend when they announced on Thursday that they would not be requiring vaccinations for students this fall.

At the end of the email, senior leadership thanked the SPU community to their yearlong compliance to COVID guidelines.

“Finally, a heartfelt thank you to the entire SPU community for your continued vigilance in following our COVID-19 guidelines while on campus,” The statement read.