Indoor Air Quality in Schools

A healthy learning environment starts with cleaner air!

Air Quality, Allergies and Asthma

It is that time of year again… Back-to-School Season! Not quite pumpkin spice or sweater weather, but still filled with lots of coziness…in schools, where children across the country will be heading back into the classroom for the new school year. If we know anything, it is that where there are children, there are germs. What follows back-to-school season and the month of August? It is not just the month of September but also illness, asthma, and allergies.

“September is known as ‘Asthma Peak Month’ because kids have returned to school, and viruses are being passed around,” said allergist Dr. Gailen Marshall, president of the American College of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology. “September also sees higher levels of environmental allergens like mold and ragweed. In addition, children may have stopped their regular asthma management routine over the summer,” Marshall added in a ACAAI (American College of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology) news release. “Generally, allergists see an increase in patients in September — more asthma attacks and more hospitalizations — especially in children.” ⁽¹⁾

Absenteeism Causes

Asthma is one of the leading reasons for absenteeism in schools. In fact, absenteeism due to asthma accounts for “13.8 million lost school days” every school year. ⁽²⁾ Some of the most common triggers for asthma sufferers are respiratory viruses and allergens. These can exacerbate asthma symptoms and can be the reason for increased absenteeism. This issue occurs yearly at a time when many schools are being asked for attendance numbers; to allocate local, state, and federal funding. ⁽³⁾ Schools can lose funding due to absenteeism, regardless of the cause.

Where there are sick students, there are sick teachers. Teacher absenteeism can be very costly to both the budget and student performance. An average of $4 billion dollars each school year is spent on substitutes and administrative costs involved with teacher absenteeism. ⁽⁴⁾ Larger school districts can see savings in the millions by reducing teacher absenteeism by just one day per teacher, per year.

Recommended Solutions

So how can we help address all these issues? The top two strategies recommended by government agencies and IAQ (Indoor Air Quality) organizations are ventilation and filtration. The proper amount of ventilation helps to dilute and remove the things in the air that can make us sick and trigger asthma attacks but this is just part of the overall solution. HEPA (high-efficiency particulate air) filtration is the only kind of filtration that can remove the smallest of airborne pathogens, like viruses and wildfire smoke. These get deep into our lungs and can cross over into the blood, creating short-term and long-term health consequences. ⁽⁵⁾

Some states, like Illinois, are getting ahead of the negative effects of poor indoor air quality by passing new laws with requirements for specific ventilation targets, to create healthy indoor air in all schools and classrooms. Illinois just passed Bill HB3713 which requires ventilation assessments, HEPA filtration equipment utilizing “A HEPA filter that captures 99.97% of 0.3-micron particles. A filter stated to be equal to or superior to a HEPA may not be used.” ⁽⁶⁾

Implementing these strategies can help reduce absenteeism, illness, and asthma attacks and improve cognition, learning, funding, and budgets! The return on investment for ensuring indoor air quality in schools can be quantified in far more than dollars. The biggest return on investing in cleaner indoor air is in the overall health, and improved wellbeing of those who learn and work in our schools.

Improve indoor air quality in schools…reduce illness and absenteeism. Stay tuned for how you can implement these strategies, and more, in next month’s blog post.

For more information and resources on allergies and asthma at school, visit the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America | AAFA. ⁽⁷⁾

Additional resources:

Do the homework – Educating the Educators in Air Quality

Early Childhood Air Quality Guidance

Back-to-School Season

Air Quality, Allergies and Asthma

Absenteeism Causes

Recommended Solutions

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