>> building a better bay area. moving forward. finding solutions. this is abc7 news. kristen: i'm kristen sze. you are watching "news getting answers." we asked experts your questions every day atwe've got breaking . san francisco unified has just announced it will no longer require masks in some schools come march 12, but other schools will still have to mask up a little longer. we will get the details from our special correspondent and answer your questions about masks, the new white house plan, and more. also tax day is right around the corner. we will be helping you out with your tax questions this year. michael flynn he will join us with a live conversation with an expert. first, the battle over berkeley

-- after uc berkeley lost its appeal to the state supreme court to have an enrollment cap lifted, it was looking at the prospect of having to send out 5000 fewer acceptances, in order to enroll 3000 fewer students this fall. applicants waiting for their admission decisions were worried their chances of being admitted to one of the top public universities in the world just dropped. we just learned the university has found ways to save as many undergraduate slots as possible. and it does not actually have to/enrollment by 3000 in order to comply with the court order. today we got details from uc berkeley's assistant vice chancellor for communications and public affairs, dan mobile -- dan m. we are going to focus on answers for the over 100,000 applicants who are now wondering, what does this mean for them? and what uc berkeley is doing in the wake of the ruling to mcgrew

-- to make room for as many as possible. i think we should clarify there's acceptance and enrollment. those numbers are not the same. not everyone accepted will enroll. how many students were you hoping to enroll this fall? how many can you enroll now? >> we should also between graduates and undergraduates. let's go right to the bottom line, around the numbers that i think will impact and interest people the most. that is due to a wide range of really amazing mitigation strategies. we are going to be able to offer admission to all of the undergraduates we plan to. that's the good news. the bad news. the bad news is about 1100 of them, about 1150 will be required to be all online further fall semester in 2022. after which they can come to campus or in person, on campus learning, in the spring semester starting january 2023.

another 650 und und und und will be enrolled, but only to begin in january, 2023. in other words, we will be able to enroll in one form or another during the next academic year. all the undergraduates that we plan to, nearly 2000 undergraduate students, are not going to have the collegiate experience they worked so hard for. kristen: so the bulk of the losses come from the graduate student seats. that surprises me -- because i thought the graduate decisions had already gone out. >> yeah, so, we initially believed the same thing. it turns out berkeley is a small city. 60,000, 70,000 people, with 25 separate graduate programs. it turned out not all of them laid in. we discovered we could in fact reduce enrollment among graduate

students by some 400 students. together with the measures i just mentioned, that will allow us to comply with the court's ruling. the graduate students will come primarily, perhaps solely from our college of engineering, law school, and business school. in effect, in terms of enrollment in one form or another, we have been able to protect new incoming undergrad students. kristen: you are trying to prioritize the undergraduates, the freshman. let's talk about that. >> before we go -- sorry to interrupt. we have also taken extra ordinary measures to prioritize california students. 90% of students coming in will be california residents. that is an increase over what was originally planned. in terms of the mitigation measures that were taken. kristen: so out-of-state and international together would be less than 10% now? >> right around 10%.

kristen: what was it before? >> i don't have that number andy. you guys called me right in the morning. it's hard to keep track. kristen: in terms of bringing more students on, offering them enrollment online only for the first semester, do you think that impacts their student experience? are you certain you can deliver as good of an education, when the intro classes are taken online for a semester? >> we have no doubt we can deliver an excellent education in the context of online learning, but you can ask any student, it's not the same. we believe in the be nefits of in-person learning. it's tragic that this court order is going to stand in the way of us delivering that to thousands of students, we worked so hard to have that opportunity. kristen: you are also going to

have some people enroll and become berkeley students in the spring. not the fall. >> that's right. they will need to delay their enrollment. kristen: why is it that you can accommodate the addition of some students in the springtime? some people leave after the fall? >> good question. we have thousands of students who graduate midyear every year. kristen: ok. also, will there be more taking part -- i know you have a lot of robust off-campus study programs, whether it's in the capital, overseas -- how does this change? >> will help to increase enrollment in those programs by a few hundred students, creating even more space for incoming freshmen and transfer students. kristen: will you still need to maintain a bigger waitlist? now that you figured out places where you can kind of save some spots? is that still necessary? all the talk on red and college

confidential is that it's going to be a bloodbath of rejections and a huge waitlist. >> because of the mitigation strategies, there are not going to be more rejections for incoming undergraduates. whether transfer students were freshman. we have been able to mitigate that. as far as the waiting list goes, we are most definitely going to keep a longer waiting list, because there is still hope that there will be a legislative remedy in the weeks ahead. that will allow us to move ahead, and to provide the sounds of students with the exact sort of collegiate experience they worked so hard to get. so we want to keep that option open and not close that door before we have to. kristen: what is the deadline for any type of legislative help? that based on your enrollment calendar? >> that's really hard to say. it really depends on the nature of the legislative fix. i wish i could give you something exact. i hope that's going to become a

little clearer in the days ahead. right now that's uncertain. kristen: do you know what type of state legislative action might be on the table? >> i can only speak generically. some are looking at what could be revising the underlying law, the california environmental quality act. then there are a number of other possible technical changes or short -- that are short-term or temporary changes, suffice to say, it is a confusing array of options, but what's important to take away is that work on that front has not ceased. we continue to be an active conversation with our partners in sacramento. kristen: will your emissions team be sending out their letters, if you will, digitally these days -- it is a portal these days. is that being pushed back? >> same time, because we know, look, we are not operating in isolation, uc berkeley is sending out the letters at the same time other universities are

-- we need to make sure that students who have applied to uc berkeley know what their options are before they make one of the most important decisions in their young lives. kristen: will this decision only impact this year's graduating seniors? or do you think the spillover effect will affect students stus long-term? >> certainly, if this stands, it is likely to unless there is a legislative remedy, the financial consequences of what is happening are calamitous. and probably at least of the tune of $57 million. a shortage of that kind of money is definitely going to have an impact on the university's ability to support and provide our students with the experience they expected, want, need, and deserve. we are working in uncharted territory. we can't exactly delineate the impacts. but we know we are going to face some really serious challenges, due to the financial impact of

the court's decision. kristen: my final question is -- what would you like to tell students who have been a nervous wreck for the past few weeks and are a little more panicked since yesterday? what would you like to tell them? >> i would say to those in new incoming undergraduates, whether you are freshmen or transfer student, we have pulled out all the stops to be able to offer one form of enrollment or another, for next year. unfortunately, it may not be the one hope for. fortunately, it's going to apply to only a small portion of our incoming class. about 1800 out of an incoming class of some 9000. but it's unfortunate. we are going to work like heck to make sure that the experience you have it uc berkeley is the best it can possibly be. we are going to work like heck to make sure the impacts of this court decision are short-lived and minimal. kristen: that was the uc

berkeley spokesman with our conversation today. we will continue to follow this story about the impact on berkeley's enrollment. coming up, we will talking about the breaking news we just told you about, san francisco unified dropping their enormous mandate at some

kristen: breaking news -- san francisco unified has just reached an agreement with its teachers union and announced starting march 12, after the state school must mandate expires, it will no longer require masks at middle schools and high schools. come april 2, masking will be strongly recommended at all schools, including for the youngest kids, from transitional

kindergarten on up. joining us to talk about the latest covid headlines is abc 7's special correspondent. dr. patel, good to see you. san francisco indicated it may not drop the mess mandate, them in the state mandate expired. now it's taking this sort of steppingstone approach. does that make sense to you? to unmask the middle and high schoolers first? >> it might make sense to me in theory that if we are going to slowly peel back masks, we want to make sure we are keeping those who are most vulnerable protected the longest. but in terms of saying -- i read this just now in the press release, saying this is going to give parents more time to go out and get vaccinated -- there's two sides to that. people of kids age five to 11 who have not yet gotten their kids vaccinated, who are may be hesitant, hopefully this pushes them to go and get those kids vaccinated or at least asking more questions on that they know that mandates are being lifted. parents under the age of five might be going to daycare or

entering preschool, this might not affect them at all because we know vaccines will be available. in that sense, it may make sense but i don't know if it's going to make a huge difference in the vaccine rates waiting for those younger kids. kristen: what is the latest with regard to vaccine availability for the youngest kids? >> the latest is that we are still waiting for the data. you're talking about kids age five and under. we are still waiting to see that trial data come out after all the roller coaster we went through over the past month. i don't anticipate we will get a clear signal of where it will go until at least april. i haven't heard any breaking news. earlier this week, the news going around was the early study showing early vaccine efficacy against all infections and those -- in those age five to 11 because a lot of alarm among parents. but the bottom-line recommendation is that protection against severe illness and hospitalization is still very high. the recommendation still stands in place that parents should go

get their kids vaccinated. none of these studies have shown increased safety concerns with the vaccines at all. which is important to highlight. >> -- kristen: before we move on, i was having this conversation, now that the masks are becoming optional in schools, i asked my highschooler if he plans to unmask and he says he wants to see what his friends do. i think for kids, peer influence is a big factor. how do you weigh that? how do you think students and parents might want to discuss and approach this and decide this? whether i should unmask? >> what you just ended is a perfect first outcome, for parents to have that discussion and kids to have the discussion about their own risk factors, their level of comfort,, understanding with many other things in life, there is such thing as a zero risk. so what is the risk if you catch it for you individually? aside from that, it's important

to remember there were still a recommendation to mask if you are at high risk or if you feel like you want that level of protection. we can't enter into a place where we are stigmatizing those who choose to do that. those conversations have to be had. people need to remember if you feel like you want the protection, continued to wear one, others need to respect that, even after the mandates get lifted. kristen: one florida governor ron desantis at a high school was telling those students behind them to take off their masks -- i was wondering, no longer mandate doesn't mean take them off the second then you should not choose to wear them. is that a worry? >> yes. this speaks to the fact that i worry about some stigmatizing. politics getting in play. if you feel comfortable wearing a mask, that is your right. if you watch the video, one student glares at the governor and keeps his mask on. i was like, right on. kristen: that kid, they eventually moved in from out of the camera shot. two truths and a lie. >> everyone knows how we play

this game, tell us which one of these is not true. as it a, the national covid-19 preparedness plan focuses on vaccine equity, reopening, and treatment, b, the test to treat plan should include reviewing a patient's medications to avoid adverse interactions, or c, both new york state and the cities he presented the same data showing a decline in vaccine protection for five to 11-year-olds. which one of these is not true? kristen: i'm only going to give you 10 seconds on facebook live to submit your answers and consider them. we don't have a lot of time. i know b is true. at least i think it is. and i think c is true as well. i think you've got a little tricky here. a is the lie, because one of those -- variant detection is not in there. i've just been affirmed by

a couple of our regulars a is the lie. >> a is actually true. kristen: great. you guys failed me. i'm just getting. thank you very much for participating. let's listen and. >> if you look at the white house plan, those of the four tenants that are outlining this 96 page proposal. well-organized. especially the part about preparing for mu variants. a is in fact true. some medications can interact with other medications used to treat heart disease or high cholesterol. those are some of the interactions to look out for. c is tricky and not true because the new york state study only looked at new york state data that was preprint. the city's he put out a study looking at 10 states. the sea kind of further

emphasized the point that we have to look at these vaccine efficacy's over a broader time period and remind people they still work against severe illness and hospitalizations. c was to tell people headlines can be tricky. kristen: indeed. i want to complement betty, joe, forgetting c correctly. don't go away. one more question on facebook live. when we come back, we will talk to michael f

kristen: tax time is once again around the corner. on monday, april 18th this year. michael f. is here to answer your text questions. partnered with the united way. >> hey, kristin. we haven't done this for a year. we skipped last year because of the pandemic. we are back. we do this every single year. we are doing things a little different this year. here's a deal.

you cannot call in this year, you have to go to social media, #askfinney, abc seven.com, or to the abc7 facebook page and ask your question there. we have experts, like cpa's and united way bay bringing me to this guy right here, he's an expert and volunteer with the united way bay area. i wanted to talk to you about a child tax credit. it's different this year than last year, correct? >> correct. >> what is the tax credit? >> the most basic is a credit if you have children that are on your tax return. a child is anyone under 17 years of age. you get a credit.

if you have a child who is under six years of age, you get an extra credit. that is really what the credit is. >> it is pretty complicated. last year, you didn't have to do anything. a check came in the mail and that was the end of it? >> you just had children on your return and you claimed the credit, when you verified your tax return. this time, you have advanced credit payments for six months. under 17 but over six years will. he received $300 for six months. sorry, $250 for six months. $1500 as advanced credit payments for the year. when you file a tax return, you can claim the other amount. >> you have to file taxes to get the second. >> to get the balance of the payment. he only got the advance. -- you only got the advance.

kristen: we are trying to get michael's microphone back. sorry about that. we are working on michael's microphone. michael and united way will be there answering your questions until 7 p.m. tonight, you can submit questions on social media using the #askfinney

kristen: we have reconnected with michael. we want to get back to him to answer your tax questions. michael?

>> questions tonight until 7 p.m. right here on channel seven, you get a hold of them along with the cpas by going online to abc7news.com, or our facebook page, just look for abc7 news' facebook page. we have an expert to answer questions right now, we want to talk to him about the child tax credit because it gets complicated. we are going to start from the beginning. this was part of the relief. that came through congress and president biden. >> yes. part of the american rescue panel. c advanced child tax credit. and previously years, you only got it when you filed your tax return at the end of the year. this year, you get advanced

child tax credit payments, which are typically half the amount that you would get for the whole year. and you get the other half when you file a tax return. >> ok, so you should have received it if you are eligible for this, you should've received about half the money right now, then took out the other half you have to file your taxes. that's where it gets complicated. they send you a letter with information. >> they send you a letter, but in some cases you can also go online and look it up. the important thing to keep in mind is that if you are a married couple, the credit that is shown is shown for spouse -- per spouse. it is only half the credit given to you. you can't make mistakes on the new report and the tax return. if you have any mistakes, that could have complications. >> thank you very much. sorry for the confusion here. we will be here until 7 p.m., answering your questions.

you can go online to the facebook page of abc7 or our website. tonight, a special edition of "world news tonight." russia's horrific escalation of attacks inside ukraine, and what authorities said could have been the worst nuclear disaster in europe. russian forces shelling the largest nuclear power plant in ukraine, the largest in europe. fire breaking out near six nuclear reactors. russian troops seizing the plant after a fierce fire fight. and tonight across ukraine, the russian military targeting civilians. a missile strike destroying an apartment building. reports dozens have been killed. a school bombed. the search for possible victims. and tonight in the capital of kyiv, ukrainians sheltering underground. new 3-d images of the russian convoy outside kyiv. what the pictures now