With five simple words last year, Maine issued guidance that speaks volumes about how extreme weather is changing school. The law, Temperature Standards for School Buildings, clearly calls for each district in the state to set minimum and maximum temperature limits under which schools can operate. 

Cambria Heights Elementary in Cambria County, Pennsylvania has brought a 346-panel rooftop solar array online to help offset added electricity demand from a new air-conditioning system and lower utility costs for years to come, WJAC reported.

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According to WJAC, the district worked with a state-approved energy savings company on the installation, and state funding provided more than $1 million for the project. Cambria Heights Elementary has a new heating system and energy-efficient lighting as well, which will help the district reduce wasted energy.

A school energy project that had not advanced beyond planning last spring is moving toward construction, with work now envisioned over the next three summers.

The Juneau School District says funding discussions indicate almost $5 million could go toward new heating and ventilation controls at Kax̱dig̱oowu Héen Elementary, Juneau-Douglas High School: Yadaa.at Kalé, Sít’ Eetí Shaanáx̱-Glacier Valley Elementary, Harborview Elementary, and Thunder Mountain Middle School. The district has completed the energy audits required under the federal Renew America’s Schools program.

The proposed work centers on direct digital controls, computerized systems that allow building operators to schedule equipment, monitor conditions, identify faults, and manage mechanical components from a central interface. The U.S. Department of Energy says modern controls can also enable remote oversight and more precise operation of heating and ventilation equipment.

Torrance Unified School District classrooms are baking through a Southern California heat wave with just 25% of them air conditioned, according to a district spokesperson, and a $520 million bond that could have funded a fix never even made it onto the November ballot. Parents behind a petition drive that gathered more than 1,500 signatures wanted district leaders to ask voters for the money. Instead, families are left with portable fans, ice blocks, and hydration stations while they wait for a longer-term solution.

UPPER SANDUSKY — Aging school facilities and hot weather can be an uncomfortable, even dangerous combination.

Upper Sandusky Exempted Village Schools closed for four out of five days the week of Aug. 31, when Northwest Ohio was under a heat advisory.

Superintendent Eric Landversicht said he had to close school Tuesday through Friday of that week.

“We’ve got very old buildings, and some of them were built before air conditioning was even a consideration,” he said.

The sales tax dedicated to school construction on the ballot this fall could generate more than $1.27 billion over the next three years, if it’s approved in all 47 counties and cities that are considering it this year.

These estimated revenue projections come from the Virginia Municipal League, based on data from the Virginia Department of Taxation. The estimates were provided Tuesday to members of the state’s Commission on School Construction and Modernization during its first meeting in more than three years.

Voters in 47 Virginia localities will decide whether to approve a 1% sales tax to fund school construction costs in their communities this November.

Local leaders across the state raced to get the referendums on the ballot ahead of an August deadline after legislation passed this year gave communities this new route for raising funds to fix aging schools.

Now, the referendums are one of the main topics of a gathering this week of the state’s Commission on School Construction and Modernization, which is meeting for the first time in more than three years.

For the third year in a row, Delaware school districts are unlikely to have enough money to build new school buildings, despite concerns about overcrowding in the southern part of the state. 

Last month, the Delaware Department of Education said in an email to the state’s 19 districts that it is prioritizing school construction projects that cost $15 million or less – an amount that is effectively too low to build a modern school from the ground up. 

Springfield Public Schools in Springfield, Mo., recently celebrated the completion of two new middle school facilities with ribbon-cutting ceremonies, according to a district news release. The district officially opened the new Pipkin Middle School and Reed Academy on Sept. 3, both of which were funded through the $220-million Proposition S bond program approved by voters in 2023.

The new Pipkin Middle School measures about 114,750 square feet and replaces a 101-year-old facility located about a quarter-mile away. The district partnered with Paragon Architecture for the school’s design and Crossland Construction for construction. The project had a budget of about $53.1 million, local news reports.

NEW YORK – Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani and New York City School Construction Authority (SCA) President and Chief Executive Officer Celeste A. Ramirez today officially opened the new John Dewey Annex in Gravesend, adding critical middle school capacity for families in Brooklyn.

The new annex is one of 10 new school facilities opening across New York City for the 2026–27 school year, together adding 4,656 seats citywide and providing students with modern classrooms, specialized learning spaces and facilities designed to support students with a range of educational needs.

An enormous clean energy resource may be sitting unused above North Carolina's classrooms. WRAL reported that a new analysis found public school rooftops across the state could produce enough electricity each year to equal the power use of nearly 150,000 homes.

COLUMBIA, S.C. — South Carolina's new budget sets aside $1 million for a program that will digitally map public college campuses to help law enforcement and other emergency responders get where they need to go faster.

When an emergency happens in a classroom, whether at an elementary school or a major university, one of the biggest challenges for first responders can be figuring out how to get to the right place quickly. The initiative uses software designed to give first responders up to date digital maps to information about school buildings, including entrances, exits and individual rooms.

Five of the seven Portland Public Schools board members directed the district Tuesday night to continue working on scenarios that could close up to 20 schools.

Superintendent Kimberlee Armstrong had asked the board to weigh in as the district’s school closure and consolidation plans move into a critical stage over the next three months. If the board’s preference was to scale back the scope of the proposed changes, Armstrong said district staff needed to know, so they could adjust their work accordingly.

Common bacteria found in classroom dust are associated with reduced lung function in children according to research presented at the European Respiratory Society (ERS) Congress in Barcelona, Spain. The research may show us how to make sure schools are healthy environments for children and their developing lungs.

The study was presented by Dr Soutrik Banerjee from the Department of Environmental and Prevention Sciences, University of Ferrara, Italy and French technology company, Alten S.A.

Dr Banerjee told the Congress: "We know that indoor air quality in schools can be affected by pollutants, humidity, ventilation, temperature, dampness and biological agents like fungi and bacteria. However, much less is known about whether the types of bacteria growing in classroom dust are linked to children's lung function.

"One might call it Christmas in September" - that's what Adelup says with Guam now expected to receive over $105 million in remitted federal income tax and fee collections. Senators are now looking at ways those extra funds can be used to fill in critical funding gaps, from directly providing relief to working families to making sure our children have a safe learning environment to call home.

Guam's Treasury is set to receive more than $105 million from the U.S. Government on September 15 through Section 30 or "cover back" funds, which reimburse the territory for the local impact of federal activities. Lawmakers note that means the island will be getting nearly $20 million more than the original $85.2 million that was expected.

Douglas County School District is grappling with a change in law in one of its most populous communities. The Castle Rock Town Council passed an ordinance Tuesday night changing the way land and funds dedicated to schools are allocated.

Historically, developers have dedicated land or funding for future public schools. The town holds these assets until the district is ready to build a school, but now the district will need to meet certain conditions and timelines, or the land may be used for other purposes.

Educators, lawmakers, students and architects gathered in Boise and Star Wednesday to celebrate the groundbreakings of two new schools.

The projects will give hundreds of students in the West Ada and Middleton districts new classrooms in 2027 and 2028 — and get some of those students out of portables.

(The West Ada School District serves parts of Boise, Star, Garden City, Kuna and Eagle, as well as Meridian. The Middleton School District covers Middleton as well as the portion of Star that lies in Canyon County.)

COLUMBUS, Ohio (WSYX) — Columbus City Schools is launching an LED lighting conversion project across 10 school buildings to reduce utility bills and redirect the savings to classrooms, according to a joint statement from the district and community advocacy groups.

District officials say the switch will save $59,480.38 in energy costs during its first year, with savings projected to climb as utility rates increase.

In K-12 school architecture, a shift is occurring. For years, school-safety discussions focused on reactive, visible reinforcements. The immediate response to security threats involved retrofitting schools with steel bars, security shutters and windowless concrete entryways. While these measures were intended to protect, they frequently transformed centers of learning into cold, institutional spaces. Today, educational architects and school districts recognize that physical security must coexist with a student’s psychological well-being. 

RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC) — Richmond Public Schools (RPS) has kicked off its series of community meetings on Tuesday to help determine which of its aging school buildings should be prioritized for immediate investments.

On Tuesday, Sept. 1, parents, community members and RPS staff took part in an interactive exercise to assess the conditions of the district’s 50 school buildings and rank them based on their needs.