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Role of local councils
In Victoria, councils are required under the Public Health and Wellbeing Act to provide immunisation services to children living or being educated within their municipal district.
Councils work in partnership with schools to deliver an annual Secondary School Immunisation Program (SSIP), providing free vaccines for adolescents in Year 7 and Year 10 as part of the National Immunisation (NIP).
Each council immunisation provider or their contracted immunisation provider must have policies and procedures to provide school-based immunisation services to schools in their local government area.
Role of secondary schools
The role of secondary schools is to:
- communicate with students and parents/guardians, school staff, and the wider school community about adolescent immunisation
- appoint a school immunisation coordinator to liaise with the council immunisation provider
- share student and parent/guardian information to the council as permitted by the Public Health and Wellbeing Regulations
- ensure appropriate resources and environments are available for the program to run safely and effectively on vaccination day.
Student information data sharing
Schools are required to support the delivery of the SSIP in their school by sharing student data.
Under the Public Health and Wellbeing Regulations a council may request the person in charge of a secondary school to disclose student and parent/guardian contact details for the purposes of delivering the Victorian Secondary School Immunisation Program.
Parents/guardians of Year 7 and Year 10 students should be provided with a collection statement and the purpose of why schools are required to provide this information to councils. Parents/guardians must be provided with information on who to contact should they request their contact details not to be shared.
Guidance is available for schools how to extract this student data to share with councils.
Consent
Valid consent for each vaccine must be provided by parents/guardians/medical decision maker for students to receive free adolescent vaccinations at school.
Parents/guardians can provide either via consent online or via hard copy consent form.
From 2024, online immunisation platforms such as the Central Immunisation Records Victoria (CIRV) may be used by councils to obtain consent for vaccination electronically SSIP. Councils will provide a dedicated link to schools to share with parents/guardians.
Parents/guardians/medical decision maker can withdraw consent at any time before vaccination takes place:
- where consent has been given online, and follow the prompts to withdraw consent, or
- where consent has been given on the hard copy consent form, notify the school or council to advise the student's name, year level and the vaccines the withdrawn consent applies to.
- نموذج الموافقة على برنامج التحصين للمدارس الثانوية للصف السابع - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Arabic)ܦ̮ܘܿܪܡ ܕܡܩܲܒܠܵܢܘܼܬܵܐ ܠܚܘܼܪܙܵܐ ܕܡܚܲܣܢܵܢܘܼܬܵܐ ܓܵܘ ܡܲܕܪܲܫܬܵܐ ܬܪܲܝܵܢܝܼܬܵܐ ܩܵܐ ܣܸܕܪܵܐ ܕ 7 - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Assyrian)Obrazac za davanje pristanka za program imunizacije u srednjoj školi za učenike 7. razreda - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Bosnian)၇တန်းနှစ် အလယ်တန်းကျောင်း ကာကွယ်ဆေးထိုးအစီအစဉ် သဘောတူညီကြောင်းပုံစံ - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Burmese)中学 7 年级免疫接种计划同意书 - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Chinese - simplified)七年級中學免疫接種計劃同意書 - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Chinese - traditional)فرمه رضایت پروگرام تزریق واکسین مکتب متوسطه صنف هفتم - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Dari)فرم رضایت برنامه واکسیناسیون سال هفتم مدرسه متوسطه - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Farsi)कक्षा 7 माध्यमिक विद्यालय टीकाकरण कार्यक्रम Secondary School Immunisation Program सहमति फॉर्म - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Hindi)Surat persetujuan program imunisasi sekolah menengah kelas 7 - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Indonesian)7 တီၤကၠိဖိ တီၤထီကၠိတၢ်ဆဲးကသံၣ်ဒီသဒၢအတၢ်ရဲၣ်တၢ်ကျဲၤ အတၢ်ဟ့ၣ်တၢ်ပျဲအလံာ်တကွီၢ်ဒိ - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Karen)ទម្រង់បែបបទយល់ព្រមសម្រាប់កម្មវិធីចាក់ថ្នាំបង្ការសិស្សមធ្យមសិក្សាថ្នាក់ទី 7 - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Khmer)Образец за согласност за Програмата на имунизација на ученици во седма година на средно училиште - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Macedonian)Образац за давање сагласности за учешће у програму имунизације ученика 7. разреда средње школе - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Serbian)7 වසර ද්විතීයික පාසල් ප්රතිශක්තිකරණ වැඩසටහන අනුමත කිරීමේ පෝරමය - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Sinhalese)Foomka ogolaanshaha/fasax bixinta barnaamijka tallaalka dugsiga sare ee year 7 - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Somali)Ortaokul 7. sınıf aşılama programı onay formu - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Turkish)Mẫu chấp thuận chương trình tiêm chủng cho lớp 7 trường trung học - Year 7 immunisation information and consent (Vietnamese)
- Meningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - ArabicMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - AssyrianMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - BosnianMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - BurmeseMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - DariMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - FarsiMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - HindiMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - IndonesianMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - KarenMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - KhmerMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - MacedonianMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - SerbianMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - Simplified ChineseMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - SinhaleseMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - SomaliMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - Traditional ChineseMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - TurkishMeningococcal ACWY Secondary School Vaccine Program consent card form - Vietnamese
Special risk cohorts
Students with disability
Vaccination can be a stressful experience for students, particularly for students who have disability. Resources have been developed by Cancer Council Victoria in consultation with Murdoch Children’s research Institute and Scope Australia to guide parents/guardians to support their .
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adolescents
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have higher rates of some vaccine-preventable diseases compared to non-Indigenous persons. For this reason, extra vaccines are recommended and are available free through the National Immunisation
Students who missed vaccinations at school
Students who miss immunisation on the day of the school vaccination should be offered catch-up vaccination. Councils should advise parents/guardians about the options to access free catch-up which may include their local council, GP or community pharmacy.
Further information about catch-up vaccination is available for councils on the catch-up vaccination page and for parents/guardians on the Better Health .
Resources
Chief Health Officer letter to school principals
Accompanying resources
Reviewed 17 February 2025