Philadelphia-area universities ask for vaccination or testing compliance

PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) -- The push to vaccinate continues as more and more institutions are tightening their policies. As colleges hope to keep in-person classes going, they're taking vax or test policies seriously.

On the heels of the news that more than 100 students have been temporarily suspended from Penn State University for not complying with vaccination or weekly COVID-19 testing requirements, we checked in with some local universities to see how students are complying.

At Temple University, an email went out Tuesday to students who missed the September 17 deadline to either submit proof of vaccination or make an exemption request, encouraging them to do so as soon as possible in order to meet the October 15 deadline.

Rowan University officials say the campus vaccination rate is around 90%, but students who have a medical or religious exemption have to test weekly.

SEE ALSO: 117 Penn State University students temporarily suspended for missing COVID-19 tests

Penn State University has temporarily suspended more than 100 students for not complying with weekly COVID-19 testing requirements.

Dean of Students Kevin Koett says some students have missed one of their weekly tests.

If they miss more, they won't be allowed to attend class.

"If you miss a second, then you start to lose your privileges: you can't go to class, you can't be in housing. Worst case scenario, if somebody says, 'look I'm not going to be compliant at all,' then we would dismiss them from the university," said Koett.

The state of New Jersey has updated its data dashboard for K-12 schools, showing 23 outbreaks in schools statewide.

The data is broken down by county. Mercer County has the most outbreaks with six.

An outbreak is defined by the state as three or more cases linked to in-school transmission in a 14-day period.

While some schools, like Robbinsville High School, went virtual for the week because of positive cases, others are having individual students, staff or classrooms go virtual if positive cases pop up.