This year’s 22nd annual National Healthy Schools Day signature event was the AIR JUST AIR national summit. With the growing realization of the impacts of both the climate crisis, and the pandemic on children’s health and learning, summit speakers focused on two key issues: improving and measuring indoor air and reducing indoor pollutants through cleaning and disinfecting classrooms with safer, less polluting products.
Air Just Air, Clean Air in Schools (2024) includes summaries of each presentation, quotes, selected slides, and Appendices with links to the summit video, additional resources, and biographies of speakers. Breakout room comments were also incorporated.
Keeping Schools Open for All
“The critical importance of indoor air quality was elevated during the COVID pandemic and continues today,” said Healthy Schools Network Founder and Executive Director Claire Barnett. Since early in the pandemic, HealthySchools Network and scores of health and environment advocates have called for more federal funding to help US EPA to address Indoor Air. Added Barnett, “We have also urged federal and state agencies to help schools develop and adopt infection prevention and control plans focused on clean indoor air, clean water and clean facilities.” This step would not only protect children’s health, but would help facilities stay open longer, or reopen safely sooner after environmental disasters like hurricanes, tornadoes, extreme heat events, and wildfires.
Major Risk to Children’s Health
Indoor air pollution is a significant threat to public health everywhere, but a particular risk to school children who are required to be in schools. Dozens of studies have documented the persistence of dirty indoor air, dinosaur chemicals, pesticides, and molds in schools, while 40% of school age children have one or more existing chronic health conditions and asthma is the leading cause of absenteeism.
Selected Report Quotes
Opening speaker David Boundy, Blue Green Alliance Foundation Board commented, “We have an imperative. To transform schools to be healthier and cleaner for our kids.”
Panelist Richard Corsi, Dean, School of Engineering at UC Davis summarized, “The 3 Rs for assuring healthy indoor air quality are: remove sources, reduce sources, and remediate indoor air. … And we have absolutely failed….”
Panelist Alicia Culver, Responsible Purchasing Network, noted,“Our experience going into schools and childcare centers and office buildings is that [bleach] is not used correctly. There’s like a spray and wipe situation mostly going on, which means it’s basically aggravating the germs rather than killing them.”
Read the Report
We invite you to read the report and share it widely with colleagues.
What You Can Do: Support Legislation and Funding for Indoor Air in Schools
Healthy Schools Network also urges you to join us in supporting $100M annually for US EPA Indoor Air program and in supporting Congressman Paul Tonko’s (D-NY) bipartisan Indoor Air Quality and Healthy Schools Act of 2024.
Read the bill and see current endorsers.
Add your support, use this form.
Closing Notes
We also welcomed our 317 summit registrants who came from 18 nations, 39 states, and seven Tribal Nations, of whom 106 were directly involved with schools (superintendents, parents, personnel), plus representatives of 89 public agencies, 98 NGOs, and 24 for-profits.
We are profoundly grateful to our sponsors: the American Federation of Teachers, the National Education Association, the George Washington University’s Milken Institute School of Public Health’s Climate and Health Initiative, Project Green Tree, and the Learning Disabilities Association of America and its Healthy Children Project, as well as Healthy Indoors e-magazine for live-streaming the event.
