Bunbury Cathedral Grammar School among first in WA to offer onsite COVID vaccinations for students

Alexandra Keech chose to get vaccinated to help keep her family safe. (ABC South West: Zachary Bruce)

A school in the South West has become one of the first in Western Australia to set up an onsite COVID-19 vaccination clinic in a bid to get jabs to senior school students before end-of-year exams.

Bunbury Cathedral Grammar School (BCGS), located about 180 kilometres south of Perth, organised for a GP outreach service to offer vaccines to students after parents contacted the school asking for help.

Head of school Matthew O'Brien said parents of boarding students were worried about how their children would get vaccinated.

Head of school Matthew O'Brien says parents of boarding students were worried about how their children would get vaccinated. (ABC South West: Zachary Bruce)

"We said: 'Yeah, absolutely, we want to cater to the needs of our community'.

"The sooner we get everybody vaccinated the sooner we are going to be able to get back to a sense of normality throughout Australia."

Sixteen to 29-year-olds in WA became eligible for the Pfizer vaccine in August, with 12 to 15-year-olds becoming eligible on Monday.

Family a strong motivator

One of the students who signed up to be vaccinated was Year 11 student Alexandra Keech.

"I didn't even feel that I had it and I'm really relieved to have gotten it," she said.

Darcy Eagles also chose to get vaccinated for family reasons. (ABC South West: Zachary Bruce)

Family was the reason fellow Year 11 student Darcy Eagles also chose to get vaccinated at the school clinic.

"I have a lot of family over east and I haven't been able to see them because of COVID," he said.

Call for more schools to get on board

Bridgetown Medical Group GP Sarah Youngson, who provided the outreach clinic and has a son boarding at BCGS, said this was the first time she had offered her services to a school.

She said it was important to get teenagers vaccinated so they could focus on their end-of-year exams.

"The more people we can get vaccinated the better and this makes it easy for students approaching exams to come in and get their jab without having to face any of the logistical issues that might pose a barrier," Dr Youngson said.

Mr O'Brien said about one-third of eligible students were vaccinated during Monday's clinic.

He said the school would look to set up more clinics for senior school students and 12- to 15-year-old students now they were eligible.

Tracking Australia's COVID-19 vaccine rollout (ABC News)