Fort Worth state representative wants to award Mercy Culture school for low vaccination rate
.png "Fort Worth Republican state Rep. Nate Schatzline wants to award Mercy Culture Preparatory a “medical freedom award” for the school’s low vaccination rate.")
Fort Worth Republican state Rep. Nate Schatzline wants to award Mercy Culture Preparatory Academy a “medical freedom award” for the school’s low vaccination rate.
Only 14.29% of kindergartners at Mercy Culture Preparatory Academy were vaccinated for the 2023-24 school year, according to data from the state health department. The 14.29% rate includes such vaccines as MMR (measles, mumps and rubella), polio, varicella and more.
Schatzline’s comments come just a couple days after Mercy Culture’s lead pastor Landon Schott shared a similar sentiment about the school’s low vaccination rates.
“I was concerned that, number one, we’re just finding out about this,” Schatzline said in a video posted to Instagram Thursday, March 6. “Because the second concern is, why haven’t we celebrated this sooner?”
In Schott’s March 5 social media video, the pastor shared congratulations with the school’s family members for embracing freedom of health.
He also congratulated members for not allowing “government or science projects to affect how you live and lead your life.” Additionally, Schott referenced vaccine mandates and stay-at-home orders during the COVID-19 pandemic as “insanity” and noted that some people lost their jobs for refusing to comply with vaccine mandates.
“Freedom is something we take seriously, religious freedom and freedom of our health,” he said. “We’ll take it, or, as Mercy Culture says, we celebrate it. We’ll put it on the board.”
‘Medical freedom award’
In Schatzline’s March 6 social media video, the representative said he plans to award Mercy Culture Preparatory with a “medical freedom award” from his district — Texas House 93.
Schatzline also thanked parents for being “patriots” and for not giving “experimental vaccines to our children.”
“We’re protecting their medical freedom,” he said.
Mercy Culture Prep’s student handbook requires all vaccination records to be on file, and doesn’t allow students to attend if vaccination records are not current.
The policy does allow families to abstain from vaccinating their children provided they get a notarized state official affidavit, according to the handbook.
Mercy Culture Prep is not alone in having low vaccination rates. Roughly a third of Fort Worth school district elementary schools were below the 95% vaccination rate threshold to be protected from a measles outbreak during the 2023-24 school year, according to a Star-Telegram analysis of state data.
Tarrant County officials believe there’s a “moderate to high likelihood” of a measles outbreak, and are taking action to manage the situation. For anyone curious about if they’re vaccinated for measles, visit the Star-Telegram’s guide here.
Schatzline does not mention the measles vaccines by name in the video, but the measles vaccine is not experimental; it has been available since 1968.
A measles outbreak in the South Plains region of Texas has infected 198 people so far, with the majority being unvaccinated children. One child has died.
This story was originally published March 7, 2025 at 3:48 PM.
