Healthy Schools
Schools are unique built environments because children are especially vulnerable to environmental hazards. Schools are also unique built environments because of their high density, their long hours of use, the multiplicity of functions they house, and the
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ntroduction After a half century of use the Clearview Elementary School was ready to be replaced. The school board formed a committee of parents, teachers, staff, and members of the public, which recommended a green building. This approach would include careful attention to elements the committee members believed would benefit the learning environment and the health and well-being of students and staff: daylighting, temperature and humidity control, and indoor air quality. They also committed to integrated pest management in the new school building, rather than the traditional approach of frequent, routine applications of pesticides, and recommended a large garden and a nature walk as supplements to the school’s new environmental studies curriculum. A.L. Dannenberg et al. (eds.), Making Healthy Places: Designing and Building for Health, Well-being, and Sustainability, DOI 10.5822/978-1-61091-036-1_14, © Island Press 2011
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HEALTHY SCHOOLS
The green building increased the construction costs by 2 percent, a premium that was controversial among some members of the community. However, within a year of occupancy, school officials were delighted to note that student absenteeism had dropped by 15 percent, asthma visits to the school nurse had dropped by 15 percent, and standardized test scores had increased by 5 percent. In addition, reduced energy costs were on track to recoup the initial additional cost by the end of the third year.
Schools are unique environments in many ways. Most important, they are full of children. Children are not just small adults; they are especially vulnerable to environmental hazards. On a pound-for-pound basis, children breathe more air, drink more water, and eat more food than adults. Playing on floors, mouthing foreign objects, and getting dirty, they become intimate with environmental contaminants. They have immature metabolisms, limiting their ability to process some toxins. They may be unable to exercise cautions that adults would take for granted in such situations as being on stairways or near other fall hazards. And with many years of life ahead, children have a long horizon during which to manifest diseases that may result from hazardous exposures. Schools are unique environments in other ways. The average school has an occupant density between that of prisons and commercial airplanes, much higher than the average workplace. Children spend considerable time in schools, second only to their homes. Schools are multifunctional, combining classroom space with many features of a small town: food preparation, athletic facilities, transportation infrastructure, maintenance operations, and chemical hazards. School buildings often suffer from deferred maintenance and can also present structural hazards, inadequate heating and cooling, and other threats to health and safety. Finally, children are not the only occupants; schools are workplaces for teachers, administrators, and staff as well. In the United States, about 56 million students are enrolled in elementary, middle, and high schools,
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