Dear Parents and Guardians,
Re: Immunizations Reminder for the 2024-2025 School Year

You are receiving this letter as a reminder to get your child/children immunized with the required vaccines in order to start the school year in Fall 2024. Your child will not be permitted entry if we are not provided immunization records showing they have received the following vaccines by August 1st, 2024.

Prekindergarten children are required to have the following vaccines:

• Diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis (DTaP)

• Polio vaccine (IPV)

• Measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR)

• Varicella

• Haemophilus influenza type b (Hib)

• Pneumococcal conjugate (PCV13)

• Hepatitis B (Hep B)

  Kindergarten through 12th grade children entering, attending, or transferring are required to have the following vaccines before entry:

• Four or five doses of DTaP

• Four or five doses of IPV

• Two doses of MMR

• Three doses of Hep B

• Two doses of Varicella (not required if there is a history of Varicella documented by a health professional)

• Children entering 7th grade must complete one dose of Tdap (Tetanus-diphtheria- acellular-pertussis)

  Beginning August 1st, 2024, no child will be permitted to attend school without proper proof of the required immunizations. It may take time to complete any required vaccines and acquire documentation, so it is advised that you start the process soon. If you are unsure about what vaccines are not completed for your child in our records, email the school health center and the nurse will respond with your leftover required immunizations.

  If your child is non-immunized or incompletely immunized due to philosophical or religious reasons, there are new laws in place that remove those exemptions completely; therefore, no matter the circumstances, if your child is not immunized properly, they will not be permitted entry in the fall.

  If you have any concerns or questions about the required vaccines, we have included a minimal description of each vaccine and why it is required at our school. If you do not feel the need to read it and you feel comfortable already, thank you for your attention and we hope to see your child in school this upcoming fall.

Rhetorical Rationale:

Audiences:

1.     Unvaccinated 18-year-old’s and unvaccinated adults

2.     Parents of young children and teens who are weary about vaccines or uneducated

3.     New mothers and fathers in the maternity wing of a hospital

Genres:

1.     Infographic offering CDC statistics about 3 different vaccination percentages and persuasive statements to get vaccinated, targeting audience 1.

2.     Email to parents of newly enrolled students reminding them to get proper vaccinations and send in proof in order for their children to enter and giving some important reasoning for each vaccine, targeting audience 2.

3.     Poster pasted on the walls of a maternity/delivery unit of a hospital giving quick facts that debunk the myths about vaccines to convince new parents to vaccinate their babies, targeting audience 3.

When planning project 3, I wanted to pick a topic that I am passionate about so I can provide my true and accurate stance through specific genres that I thought would be appropriate for this topic. The topic of anti-vaccination is a highly controversial one, so I tried to be colorful in two of my genres and fairly direct in my other artifact. I felt that using colorful, eye-catching fonts and shapes would lighten the topic while making people read it who normally wouldn’t. Due to one of the audiences I chose, who already had the opposite stance that I did, making eye-catching and less direct words would be more effective in my opinion. After conducting project 1 and 2 on mental health, I thought I’d take a different approach and try and make effective artifacts that may persuade people that I wish I could persuade in real life. I chose to use certain genres to potentially reach the hard-headed, stubborn beliefs of some adults where they may not hear out a teenager who makes a video. I provided facts that they may not have known, hopefully improving my chance of persuading them to hear me out or my artifacts out.

            Due to my choice of audience being opposed to the other stance, I chose the best genres that I thought would be the most effective. I thought that if I used bold fonts and applied them to essential, shocking statistics that anti-vaxers may not have known, my opinion may reach them enough for them to read the rest. I think I was fairly successful in my infographic and poster in the sense of them reading a small bit of it at least.

            My first genre that I knew I was going to do either way was my infographic. It is a fairly long artifact, but it includes a satisfying color scheme with bolded statements and numerical statistics that will most definitely catch someone’s eye. I used logos to the best of my ability to give facts that would prove my argument to be true and supported, as I had to persuade my audience. In order to cause my audience to read my facts, I used pathos at the top to show that there have a been a lot of deaths of unvaccinated individuals, which also came from the CDC, employing a strong use of ethos. While I may not reach the people who are ignorant to any national organization, I would reach the emotions of all others who read it. The purpose of my infographic was to show proof that there are a lot of unvaccinated deaths and how many people did not have recommend vaccines. I utilized two graphs to show a simple representation of more statistics from the CDC. I used different color bars and labels so my audience/viewers could quickly and easily determine the dramatic statistical different between three to four groups of people. I wish I was able to make my graphs bigger but my artifact was already super long. I do think it would be effective in educating some people who are unvaccinated.

            My second genre I chose was an email. I decided to do an example of an email to parents of new students in a school system who have required vaccines. I chose this because this is a real-world email that gets sent out as all of the vaccines, I chose to list are true, legal required vaccines of many Florida public school systems. I used an email to share my stance because public school systems technically “share” my side; they are required by law to do so. I thought this would be a great use of ethos, as it is a legal requirement that parents have to follow if they want their children publicly educated. Due to this strict requirement that I stated in the email, I felt obligated to employ some pathos at the end to soften the email. I added some logos for parents who are not sure about vaccines, so I offered it up to appeal to their emotions and show that I wanted to help them and their children. I also used CDC and AAAI facts and summaries to ensure true information in my artifact. I believe this email would be very effective in proving how important my stance is in a child’s life and why it is so important.

            My last genre, a poster, was a last-minute choice but I think it is a very strong artifact for proving my point. My poster would be put up on the walls of a delivery wing for new mothers and fathers who are questioning getting their babies vaccinated. I decided to use pathos and logos by using commonly stated myths about why vaccines are bad and debunking them with facts that anyone can google and find out are true. I think my audience was a good choice for this genre because the new parents are overwhelmed with emotion and are probably confused so offering up important facts that disagree with common myths could be very effective in this context and genre.

            Overall, I used a lot of logos, facts and statistics, due to the fairly ignorant and strong-opinioned audiences of my issue. I believe that logos is the best way of rhetorically reaching my intended audiences and I believe that I did it quite effectively in my artifacts. Utilizing visually vibrant genres like an infographic or poster was a rhetorical choice I made due to my aimed audiences as well. In conclusion, I am proud of my artifacts, and I believe I did my best at proving my highly controversial and argumentative topic. 

Works Cited (In Artifacts):

https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/parents/why-vaccinate/vaccine-decision.html

https://www.floridahealth.gov/programs-and-services/immunization/children-and-adolescents/school-immunization-requirements/index.html#heading_2

https://www.aaaai.org/tools-for-the-public/conditions-library/allergies/vaccine-myth-fact

https://www.leonschools.net/immunizations

https://www.cdc.gov/respiratory-viruses/data-research/dashboard/vaccination-trends-adults.html

https://www.cdc.gov/respiratory-viruses/data-research/dashboard/illness-severity.html