APSU partners with Clarksville Housing Authority to vaccinate seniors

CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – On a rainy Wednesday afternoon, a long white van full of senior citizens pulled up to the 416 College St. building on the Austin Peay State University campus. Umbrellas were opened, doors propped back, and within minutes, the van’s passengers were sitting in chairs, receiving COVID-19 vaccinations from APSU nursing students.
“We rented a shuttle and we brought our seniors in because we decided to partner with Austin Peay to make sure we could get them vaccinated,” Shanale Allen, property manager for the Clarksville Housing Authority, said. “We were given this wonderful opportunity, and it’s so close to our neighborhood, we decided we needed to take advantage of it.”
In addition to the 10 senior citizens, the housing authority also had seven of its staff members vaccinated at the University. On March 2, Austin Peay opened a vaccination site on campus, providing Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine to eligible members of the Clarksville-Montgomery County community.
Shortly after the Austin Peay site opened, three members of the APSU community – Mitch Robinson, vice president of finance and administration; Ashlee Spearman, director of academic services and engagement at APSU; and Lynn Fisher, APSU emergency manager, reached out to the housing authority about providing vaccines to this high-risk population.
Wednesday, March 17, was set aside specifically to provide doses to those individuals.
“It’s fantastic,” Fisher said. “Any way we can help Montgomery County to get their most needed populations vaccinated, we’re going to work with them to do that. The housing authority jumped at the chance. Our hope in the future is to work with our unsheltered populations to get them vaccinated – hopefully in April.”
In the last three weeks, Austin Peay has administered more than 800 doses of the vaccine to members of the Clarksville-Montgomery County community. Individuals who meet the state’s current vaccination phase and want to receive the Moderna vaccine on campus need to sign up for an appointment through this link.
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