When a school is being remodeled during an active school year, students are generally moved to portable classrooms. There are plenty of other times portables come in handy too, like when the student population is thriving and schools just need some extra room.
Unfortunately, it seems like portable classrooms do more harm than good. Indoor air quality is a huge issue especially in schools, and portable classrooms are no exception. School portables are linked to radon, mold, asbestos and even dangerously poor ventilation.
Portables are created with cheap materials like plywood, particle board, insulating foams and glues. This is often because modular manufacturers build to a budget, and we all know schools don’t have a lot of money to waste when it comes to stuff like that. That shouldn’t be the case however, because indoor air quality is extremely important – even more so for children.
Dave Black, an indoor air specialist for the Northwest Clean Air Agency says that, in fact, indoor air quality is much more important than many of us realize.
“What’s the big whoop about indoor air? I had no clue. You have to be trained to know that indoor air is important. And indoor air is always worse than outside air with very few exceptions.”
The California Air Resources Board did a large-scale study of portable classrooms in 2004, and the results were not surprising. The study revealed that for nearly 40 percent of regular classroom hours there is an inadequate amount of fresh air within them. They also discovered high levels of formaldehyde exceeding recommended exposure limits in most of the portables tested. In case you didn’t already know, formaldehyde has been linked to cancer and childhood asthma – despite the fact that it’s a chemical commonly used in construction.
Peggy Jenkins one of the study’s authors spoke up about what they found.
“Formaldehyde levels were a little higher in the portables, some of the ventilation issues were greater, the lighting, moisture problems were a little greater. It did point to maybe the need for better maintenance and care for our classrooms.”
This is just the tip of the iceberg. The point here is that we need to eliminate the use of portable and modular structures in our schools. There are a lot of factors at stake, some that cannot be controlled such as a low annual budget. That being said, it’s clear that portables are doing more harm than good and they need to go. Studies like the one mentioned above have revealed school portables are linked to radon, mold, poor ventilation and much more.
If you’d like to read a little more about the California study and the dangers associated with portables, visit the source listed below.
Via: Wallowa
