Federal funding in the amount of $74,155,208.06 will go to the Virgin Islands Department of Education on St. Croix for the replacement of the Alexander Henderson Elementary School, Congresswoman Stacey E. Plaskett announced Wednesday.

“I am very pleased that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) continues to award grants to our local agencies to help with the resources needed to rebuild. This award to the V.I. Department of Education on St. Croix is to replace the Alexander Henderson Elementary School which was destroyed during Hurricane Irma and Maria. This award is for replacement to a standard that will be integral for improving our preparedness and resiliency against natural disasters moving forward.

The problem of "food deserts" in many parts of the United States has gained attention in recent years. Now, researchers are highlighting a similar issue: play deserts.

In a recent study, investigators at the University of Georgia found that in many areas of the country -- particularly the South -- families have few safe, free parks and playgrounds for their kids to enjoy.

That's a problem, experts said, because when kids lack those opportunities, they're more likely to stay inside and stare at screens.

It's well known that there are communities nationwide where people have a hard time getting to a grocery store or any other source of fresh, nutritious food. Those places have been dubbed food deserts, and an estimated 10% of the United States falls into that dubious category.

Children learn in temporary trailers because schools are short on classroom space. Teachers say they suffer stronger asthma symptoms when inside their school buildings. Waste water drips down into a teacher’s closet through a black-stained ceiling. Children hold performances, eat their lunch and take gym class in the same room — a space ill-suited for any of those roles. 

Those are just a few of the myriad problems that plague Paterson students and teachers in a district where 17 active school buildings are more than a century old, and more than 1,700 students lack adequate classroom space. 

In the final segment of its three-part series “Crumbling Schools, Struggling Students,” NorthJersey.com today focuses on the potential solutions that educators and experts have suggested across the country to tackle the staggering costs to renovate old school buildings and construct new ones, particularly in underserved, overburdened urban districts that lack the property tax base to pay for such projects on their own.

HORRY COUNTY, S.C. (WBTW) — With another round of graduations among us, some parents face tough decisions when it comes to deciding which school their kid will go to next.
News13’s Claire Purnell spoke with a mother of two Horry County Schools students who is concerned about what next school year will look like in terms of overcrowding.
Kristie McCarthy said she is not the only parent feeling this way, especially when it comes to deciding where their kid will go to high school.
McCarthy has two kids at Ocean Bay Middle School, including one who will graduate in the next couple weeks. The 8th-grader plans to go to Carolina Forest High School, but knowing the school is already at 120% capacity, they are starting to weigh their options.
“It’s 2700-ish at Carolina Forest High School and if there’s only so many kids on the football team or basketball team, what are the kids going to do?” McCarthy said.
Earlier this month, the HCS board settled on its 2024-2029 capital improvement plan in which the district plans to spend nearly $300 million to accommodate some of that growth.
 

GREEN BAY ― Green Bay's Hispanic community is mobilizing, calling on the Green Bay School Board to stop a plan to close 11 schools in the Green Bay School District.
The Northeast Wisconsin Latino Education Task Force, or NEWLET, formed in late April in response to the school district's Facilities Task Force finalizing recommendations that are inequitable, according to the group.
NEWLET is worried that the proposal will put an undue burden on students of color by splitting up their communities and removing the option to easily walk to school.
"(It) impacts the quality of life of Latino students and takes away healthy walks to school by a predefined bus schedule with limited participation in sports, athletic events, musicals and other enrichment opportunities," said Amanda Garcia, the executive director of Casa Alba Melanie and the chair of NEWLET. She was also a member of the district's Facilities Task Force.
 

At least 19 children have died in a fire in the central Guyanese mining town of Mahdia, officials say.

The fire broke out just after midnight on Monday, engulfing a secondary school dormitory and trapping students.

Emergency services are struggling to contain the fire because of bad weather conditions, the government says.

Initial investigations suggest the blaze may have been started maliciously, police say - although no suspects have yet been identified.

Earlier reports had recorded the death toll as being slightly higher, with at least 20 lives lost.

Several other people have been injured and some are being prepared for evacuation to the capital, Georgetown, where a special centre has been set up.

"This is a major disaster. It is horrible, it is painful," said Guyanese President Irfaan Ali.

Seven people, including four children, were killed when a roof over a school sports field collapsed in a storm in Thailand.
The children, aged between six and 13, were playing in the open-sided building at a school in Phichit province on Monday, watched by a number of spectators.
At about 6:30pm (local time) the storm struck, according to local media, and heavy rain and high winds caused the roof to collapse suddenly.
The fatally injured adults were two parents and a cleaner, the provincial office of public relations told the AFP newswire, while 18 people were injured.
A six-year-old boy was rushed to hospital but died of his injuries.
The injured remained in two hospitals, where they were receiving treatment.
None were reported to be in a serious condition.
A video shared on the Facebook page of the local public relations office showed a twisted mess of metal, with poles and corrugated iron lying crumpled on the ground.
 

BOSTON — State lawmakers are pushing for more funding and changes in policy to help local governments afford the rising cost of building new schools and renovating existing buildings.
A nearly $56 billion budget expected to be taken up by the Senate next week includes hundreds of millions in new funding to the Massachusetts School Building Authority, which reimburses cities and towns for a portion of the costs for new construction and school building renovation.
But lawmakers say more money is needed as persistent inflation continues to push up construction costs and eat away at existing state and local funding for the projects.
State Sen. Barry Finegold, D-Andover, has filed several amendments to the budget related to school construction, including a request for an additional $100 million dollars for the building authority. He said there are a number of schools in his district in “desperate” need of renovation, but the problem is statewide.
“The cost of these projects is going through the roof,” he said. “We need to do everything we can to help schools with these high costs.”
Finegold said the authority recently increased the reimbursement rate to a maximum of $390 per square foot, but the average cost of construction has risen to about $600 per foot.
“So in theory, if a community is getting a 60 percent reimbursement rate from the state, it’s really actually about 20 percent less than that,” he said. “These buildings are very expensive, and the added costs are falling on these communities.”
To be sure, the Senate budget calls for increase the annual cap on grants awarded by the building authority by $400 million, raising the total cap to $1.2 billion.
 

Learn strategies to address indoor air pollutants.
On April 27, three organizations—the Center for Green Schools, the National Association of School Nurses and Chemical Insights Research Institute of UL Research Institutes, a leading expert organization in indoor air quality (IAQ)—hosted a joint webinar titled “Identifying and Addressing Emerging Indoor Air Pollutants: School Health and Facilities Staff Collaborations.” This webinar highlighted opportunities for school health and facilities staff to collaborate in creating healthy learning spaces.

Panelists brought expertise from a variety of areas in public health research and health and safety management of educational environments, and they shared a common goal: fostering healthy learning spaces. Key takeaways from the webinar include:

1. Identify the problem.
Many schools struggle with maintaining good IAQ. A recent survey found 54% of public school districts needed to update or replace multiple building systems or features related to IAQ performance in their schools. Schools are vulnerable to common pollutants, such as volatile organic compounds (VOCs), semivolatile organic compounds (SVOCs), particles, allergens and biological pollutants. These pollutants come from common building materials, nearby outdoor air pollution, activities performed in the space (such as cleaning or printing), excess moisture and even people bringing allergens inside.

School staff and students are exposed to these pollutants through inhalation, ingestion and skin absorption. In buildings, pollutants can be found in the air and settled dust. Younger students are more vulnerable to pollutant exposure due to frequent hand-to-mouth behavior, higher respiration rates and closer proximity to the ground.

Panelists discussed four emerging sources of pollution in schools, including:

The Guam Department of Education is in the midst of the Herculean task to ensure all public school facilities meet the school building sanitation code. There's a chance that not all schools will be able to open in time for the start of the next school year.

GDOE has 41 school facilities. Six of those schools — John F. Kennedy High School, Tiyan High School, Okkodo High School, Astumbo Middle School, Liguan Elementary School and Adacao Elementary School — are leased. That leaves GDOE responsible for the maintenance of 35 facilities.

"The idea is to ensure that all schools are ready for inspection,” GDOE Deputy Superintendent Joseph Sanchez told The Guam Daily Post Friday evening.

GDOE has been in a race against the clock to ensure that schools across the island, leased or not, will be ready for the Department of Public Health and Social Services Division of Environmental Health inspection by Aug. 9, the day Public Law 37-4 becomes effective.

WASHINGTON — After a long, cold winter, the sound of temperatures in the 80s comes as a welcomed forecast. However, for children still in school and stuck in hot classrooms without air conditioning, it's something to dread. 
The Environmental Protection Agency released a report showing how climate change may impact students who are exposed to heat in the classroom.
The report found that heat affects a child's concentration and learning. EPA officials found that climate-driven temperatures may lead to a 4 to 7 percent reduction in annual academic achievement per child.  
Officials are concerned that learning losses could lead to future financial losses, potentially thousands per child. 
WUSA 9 has reported on children learning in hot classrooms at D.C. area schools, such as at Wheatley Education Campus. A math teacher at Wheatley Education Campus, Alexa Cacibauda, told WUSA9 that with no air conditioning, temperatures inside her classroom reached the 80s. 
"A third-grade teacher reported that her students were crying," Cacibauda said. "Students are very cranky. They're miserable."  
 

The Carson City School District’s Facilities Master Plan Committee has made its final recommendations for building and maintenance needs. Superintendent Andrew Feuling said they will be considered during the Board of Trustees’ Capital Improvement Plan discussion Tuesday, May 23.

Projects are prioritized according to the district’s financial constraints while ensuring student and staff safety, health and comfort, educational program needs and energy and operational safety, Feuling told trustees May 9.

The Fritsch Elementary and Carson Middle school campuses are nearly 70 years old and Carson High is coming up on 50 years old. All district facilities are at least 30 years old, Feuling said.

“While we have to think about maintaining those facilities, while it would be nice to say we could replace all these eventually, with the property tax caps that are currently in place, it likely won’t go away and continues to squeeze funding over time,” he said.

High schools being built in Washoe County now cost about $250 million, and Carson City can’t afford to do the same, he said. The district had the funding to build Empire, Fremont and Mark Twain elementary schools between 1988 and 1992, but those dollars aren’t available today, he said.

Marty Johnson of JNA Consulting Group, the district’s bond consultant, said Carson City has a bonding capacity of a $25 million issuance this summer or fall with another $12.5 million available by 2027. There is $5 million remaining from its last bond.

The Facilities Master Plan document encompasses overall district projects at a cost of $3 million for assessments on its properties or ones to acquire in upcoming months. Examples include heating, ventilation and air conditioning needs for Carson High School, alarm systems and security camera refreshing or to purchase 10 acres of the former Lompa Ranch.

NEW LONDON — Harbor Elementary has reopened after a two-day closure after test results revealed that the new cracks in the building’s walls and ceilings are not causing exposure to lead or asbestos. But school board Chair Elaine Maynard-Adams says the incident highlights that the district needed “a better plan” going forward. 

“The last thing we want to do is shutter a school in the middle of a school year,” Maynard-Adams told CT Examiner. 

The school was closed May 16 and 17 after cracks were discovered in the walls and ceilings on the second and third floors of the building. It serves about 240 students in kindergarten through fifth grade. 

“We are told there is a good chance that the full week of rain (and wind) that C[onnecticut] experienced a few weeks ago could be the cause of the new interior breakage of plaster, as the very old bricks of the building continue to age,” Superintendent Cynthia Ritchie wrote to parents on Tuesday. 

In her message, Ritchie noted that the Harbor Elementary building was built in 1920 and needs “extra special attention.” She said the building is tested every six months for asbestos. Maynard-Adams said the building’s air quality is also regularly tested, and that the most recent test found no issues. 

Maynard-Adams said the city had tried to retire the Harbor Elementary building over a decade ago, when the district first transitioned to an all-magnet program. 

The path is set for covering the cost of fixing Stamford school buildings, and taxpayers should prepare to dig ever deeper into their pockets for the next several years.

During that time, taxpayers should not expect major improvements to parks or other non-school city property.

That was the message that came with the final vote of the budget season, when members of the Board of Representatives Wednesday night approved a Board of Finance recommendation to increase taxes enough to raise $15 million for a school construction fund. 

Last year both boards approved a tax increase that raised $20 million, creating the original contribution to the fund.

Taxpayers can expect the same next year, Board of Finance Chair Richard Freedman said during a special Board of Representatives meeting to vote on the higher tax rate. 

An analysis by the state Office of School Construction found that if the city bonds $35 million for school projects for each of the next few years, “we will need a minimum of $15 million a year” in cash, Freedman told representatives. 

Beyond raising taxes to fund the school construction reserve, taxpayers will have to cover the cost of a significant increase in the amount of money the city borrows by issuing bonds.

In each of the last two fiscal years the city bonded $40 million, Freedman said, but in 2023-24 the amount will be $70 million, which comes with interest payments of several million dollars a year.

The borrowed $70 million will be split evenly between city and school projects, Freedman said.

“The city has its own significant capital needs – repave streets and sidewalks; the parks need a lot of work, city buildings need work. There are a lot of demands,” Freedman said. “We didn’t want to cut that, but we knew we had to fund the (schools) plan, so we had to go up to bonding $70 million, and we will for the coming years.”

George Smith Jr. looked over his shoulder every day on the walk home across the street from his Englewood school, scared of the tense environment, scared of neighborhood gangs, scared of getting jumped.
But he loved his elementary school. His band class gave him peace, his after-school programs something to do. And despite the anxiety he carried into adulthood, he was devastated when the school was one of 50 closed in 2013 by then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel.
“I got a lot of pride in that school, a lot of memories,” Smith says of his school, later renamed Woods Elementary. “To see it just be nothing now and to know what the kids had to go through to go to these different schools, it’s sad. It’s heartbreaking.
Now 40, Smith moved back to the street he grew up on, two doors from his parents George Sr. and Gladys. Sitting on their porch overlooking the former school, the family has watched the block — home to Smiths since 1883 and the school since 1964 — lose its vibrancy.
Many neighbors moved or died without others replacing them. Once-beautiful yards were overtaken by weeds. Enrollment at Woods dropped nearly 60% between 2003 and 2013, leaving the building less than half full.
The school closing marked a breaking point, the Smiths say, with the midcentury building now a shell, stripped of pipes and anything valuable left inside.
A decade has passed since Emanuel called for the closings of more American schools at one time than ever before. Chicago’s Board of Education cast its historic votes 10 years ago next week.
 

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (WVIR) - U.S. Senators Tim Kaine (D) and Mark Warner (D) reintroduced the School Infrastructure Modernization Act. This bipartisan legislation aims to make it easier for schools to use federal Historic Rehabilitation Tax Credits to renovate.

Sen. Kaine says investing in schools will help students and the economy. He says fixing old buildings is a lot more affordable than building new ones.

“Old, dilapidated structures, kids absorb a message when they walk into it like, ‘Wow, this must not be that important, or the community would care to make sure that the facility was in OK shape.’ And a lot of kids walk in these buildings every day with a message they get is, ‘They must not care about this very much,’” the senator said.

Sen. Kaine says it’s like a recycle-and-reuse mentality: “When you take an old building that has kind of a particular beauty to it and you renovate it and make it fit for current use, that’s a cool place to go to school.”

  The National Wildlife Federation (NWF), America’s largest wildlife conservation and education organization, recognized that Mason Elementary School has successfully created a Certified Schoolyard Habitat® through its Garden for Wildlife program. Mason Elementary School has joined more than 5,000 schools nationwide that have transformed their schoolyards into thriving wildlife habitats that provide essential elements needed by all wildlife – natural food sources, clean water, cover, and places to raise young. The habitat also serves as an outdoor education site where students can engage in cross-curricular learning in a hands-on way.

     Certification also makes Mason Elementary School’s Certified Wildlife Habitat® part of the Million Pollinator Garden Challenge, a national effort to restore critical habitat for pollinators.

     “Our students recognized a solvable problem in our local community regarding endangered animals in the Piedmont habitat,” says Ms. Rachel Seibert, the 3rd STEM leader.

     Principal David Jones makes it a priority for students to use STEM in impactful ways. “At Mason Elementary, we have the opportunity to teach students the curriculum and show them how to use STEM every day to solve real world issues,” he says.

     “We are excited to have another school join our growing list of more than 5,000 certified Schoolyard Habitats. Kids can now personally experience nature through hands-on learning in an outdoor environment,” says Liz Soper, director of K-12 Programs for National Wildlife Federation.

On an 81 degree day last September, environmental city planner Sharon Danks went onto the playground at a California elementary school with an infrared camera. Grassy areas in full sun measured 83 degrees, but unshaded asphalt was 107 and rubber surfaces under an exposed play structure came in at 135. Asphalt shaded by tree canopy was more than 30 degrees cooler.

Danks, the author of Asphalt to Ecosystems, a book published more than a decade ago to guide the transformation of schoolyards, wasn't surprised at what she found. She and her colleagues had made similar measurements many times over.

But shade itself had gained heat that September with the announcement that $150 million had been set aside in the California state budget for a two-year program to fund school forests and green schoolyards at K-12 schools. The decision was driven by the need to protect the health of students as average temperatures in the state continue to rise.

The September 2022 heat wave in the West was the worst on record; temperatures soared above 110 degrees in multiple cities in California. In announcing the funding for schoolyards, Wade Crowfoot, secretary of the California Natural Resources Agency, noted that average temperatures across the state were projected to rise 6 degrees by mid-century.

As bad as things might look for Californians, warming trends are projected to be even more dramatic in other parts of the country. According to a peer-reviewed model published last year, by 2053 more than 100 million Americans will live in an "extreme heat belt" extending from Northern Texas and Louisiana borders to Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin, with temperatures exceeding 125 degrees.

Most of the daylight hours that children spend outside are on school grounds. The simple act of planting trees on campuses is a powerful way to shield them from heat-related health problems.

Colorado passed a new law this spring intended to fix the facility school shortage by bolstering funding and encouraging more schools to open. 
The measure signed by Gov. Jared Polis last month will increase funding for facility schools by nearly $19 million next year, then by $23 million in 2024 and $28 million in 2025. Lawmakers and legislative staff are predicting that four new schools will open in each of the next three years, which would mean a 40% increase in schools statewide. 
“Facility schools” are specialized schools for kids who aren’t functioning well in traditional classrooms, often because of high levels of anxiety, depression and other behavioral health issues that are disruptive to learning.
The crux of the bill is a change in the schools’ funding model. The state currently funds facility schools based on a daily per-student rate of $55, which hasn’t been enough money for schools, especially small ones, to keep the doors open. Facility schools also get tuition from school districts for students in special education. The tuition ranges this year from $75 to $348 per day. 

RICHMOND, Va. (WDBJ) - The Virginia Board of Education has awarded $365 million for school construction across the state.
28 school divisions will receive funding for 40 projects, and many of them are located in central, southside and western Virginia.
Kathleen Jackson is the Chief Financial Officer of Roanoke City Public Schools.
“We’re super excited to hear that we were included in the list of awarded projects,” Jackson said in an interview Thursday afternoon.
At a time when construction costs are rising, she said it was a relief to learn that three of the five projects Roanoke City Public Schools applied for were successful.
“Just to give you an example, one of the projects we did receive funding for is the replacement school, a new building, for Preston Park Elementary School,” she said. “We were looking at, potentially we would have to pause that project, because we wouldn’t yet have the money available to complete the next phases. We don’t have that issue any more, thanks to that grant.”
The General Assembly established the criteria, and the Department of Education ranked school divisions on their poor building conditions, commitment and need.
A community’s ability to pay and fiscal stress determined whether the award funded 10, 20 or 30% of a project’s cost.