Texas schools would need silent panic buttons in classrooms and to ensure two-way emergency radios used by law enforcement and first responders work on campus under a new proposed state rule.
The proposed school safety standards rule would also require that all doors and windows that lead into school buildings be locked and monitored.
The Texas Education Agency released the specifics of the proposed rule Thursday. The proposal is the latest effort to beef up school safety in the wake of Texas’ deadliest school shooting that killed 19 children and two adults at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde in May.
In the days following the shooting, Gov. Greg Abbott directed the agency and Education Commissioner Mike Morath to develop safety rules for school buildings, including the enforcement of weekly door inspections to ensure they close and lock.
In the coming weeks, school districts can apply for grants from the agency for spending on various security-related costs over the next two years and toward the installment of silent panic alert technology this year, according to the agency’s guidance.
Grant funds will be awarded using a per-pupil count, but districts will receive at least $200,000 to ensure small rural districts can also tackle infrastructure costs.
The panic alert technology generally would allow campus staff to manually press a button or use a software application to signal a life-threatening emergency, such as an active shooter or intruder.
The system, which can already be found in some banks and hospitals, should also notify administrators and emergency responders of the threat.
 

The Long Beach Unified School District’s projected timeline for Measure E facility upgrades has been updated to prioritize Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning (HVAC) projects, according to information presented at the Wednesday, Nov. 2 board meeting. 

Measure E is a $1.5 billion bond measure the district passed back in 2016 to fund repairs, technology, air conditioning and safety across school sites. 

A shift in funding due to the governor’s budget that allocated one-time state funds to school facilities projects as well as unused contingencies from past projects are some of the main factors that prompted rebaselining. 

The new timeline proposes advancing HVAC-type projects at Charles A Buffum Elementary, Patrick Henry Elementary School, Herbert Hoover Middle School, Beach K-12 Independent Study, James Monroe High School and Benjamin Tucker Elementary by two years. 

Other school sites such as Stanford Middle School, Minnie Gant Elementary School, George Washington Carver Elementary School, Tincher Preparatory School and John Marshall Middle School can only be advanced up to a year, as Executive Director of Facilities Development and Planning, David Miranda, stated it would not be feasible to start and finish construction in the span of two years.

The committee tasked with coming up with budget recommendations for the Lawrence school district received some preliminary information about building conditions that will inform recommendations about potential school closures.
The Futures Planning Committee met for the fourth time Wednesday evening at district offices and received some aggregated cost estimates — totaling about $30 million — for improvements to the district’s elementary and middle schools. Larry Englebrick, the district’s chief operations officer for facilities and operations, said the district has been taking an in-depth look at the condition of its buildings, and while they are generally in good condition, facility needs and funding must be planned.
“We look at available funding, the facility needs, and then we have to balance what available funding do we have each year based with the projection of when we’re going to hit specific building improvement needs and maintenance needs,” Englebrick said.
Englebrick said the district’s target is to have all schools at 80% overall condition — he said a brand-new building would be at 100% — and he provided an aggregated breakdown of what it would cost to attain that goal for the district’s 13 elementary schools and four middle schools. The cost to get schools to 80% condition was $16.92 million for the elementary schools and $12.32 million for the middle schools. A lesser number, the cost to return only the schools’ “priority systems” to 80% condition, was also given, and was $12.78 million for the elementary schools and $10.38 million for the middle schools.
 

The Kentucky General Assembly’s Budget Review Subcommittee on Education heard from school superintendents about the struggle with rapidly increasing construction costs during their Nov. 2 meeting.

Chay Ritter, the Kentucky Department of Education’s (KDE’s) director of the Division of District Support, said school districts typically issue bonds or pay cash to finance projects. The bonding capacity, or a district’s borrowing power, is impacted by interest rates, credit ratings and existing debit service. Due to its bonding potential, a district can have a gap in funding that results in a project being built in phases over a longer time period, or a reduction in the project scope.

When construction is delayed, the costs may go up, Ritter said.

House Bill (HB) 678, passed by the legislature in 2022, accelerated construction projects by allowing a district to start new construction or renovation without the prior approval of KDE, Ritter said. The bill, a two-year measure that will expire unless the General Assembly takes further action in 2024, also allows a district to spend restricted funds on extracurricular facilities.

Currently, 150 of the Commonwealth’s 171 school districts are operating under HB 678.

“It saves considerable time and time is money in the construction business,” he said.

Ritter said several districts are either delaying or altering their construction projects due to the continued price increases, including:

The last time Kuna residents passed a bond to build a new school was in 2017. Since then, the city’s school district has grown by over 500 students.

It’s a common story in the Treasure Valley where districts are struggling to keep pace with the space needed to accommodate an influx of residents and their school-age children. Today, the Kuna School District is in the process of developing a bond that, if passed, would fund additional construction at Swan Falls High School, construction of a new elementary school, and other projects.

But some familiar with the issue think it is time to add another tool to the toolbox of education funding: charging impact fees to new developments.

In Kuna, Superintendent Wendy Johnson estimates it would cost $26 million to build a new, 600-student elementary school. Even being able to collect $3 million in impact fees would help offset that cost, she said.

Students entering a Lompoc Unified School District classroom see words of wisdom displayed near large rusty spots on the walls, mismatched tile, yellowed blinds and other signs of the facility’s dated condition.
Once inside, they get to sit at old desks with sea foam green chairs revealing the age of the 57-year-old Cabrillo High School campus.
“If you go through all the campuses, you will see that the needs are consistent but not identical,” said Doug Sorum, assistant superintendent of business services.
For the fourth time since 2016, Lompoc’s school district has asked voters to approve a $125 million bond measure, this one called Measure A, to undertake what district officials say is a much-needed modernization program across all of the 16 campuses. To pass, the measure must be approved by 55% of voters in the Nov. 8 election.
District officials say a local bond measure also would make LUSD eligible for approximately $46 million in state matching funds, boosting the projects that could be completed.
 

New York City will commit billions of dollars to convert 100 fuel-burning public school buildings to cleaner energy by 2030 as part of an effort to comply with emissions reductions mandated by city law, Mayor Eric Adams announced Friday.

The city will spend roughly $4 billion over the next seven years on a plan that includes retrofitting 100 school buildings so they no longer burn fossil fuels for heating. That shift will help bring the city closer to compliance with Local Law 97, which sets limits on greenhouse gas emissions that buildings must adhere to starting in 2024.

Adams also announced that every new school building, including those already under construction, will be fully electric, putting the city slightly ahead of schedule on a separate 2021 city law that effectively bans gas in new construction starting in 2024. Newly constructed public school buildings must be fossil fuel-free beginning in 2025 under that law.

“Every New York City school we build going forward will be fully electric,” Adams said Friday at a press conference in P.S. 5 in Bedford-Stuyvesant, which will be the first to get retrofitted under the new plan. “No more boilers, no more burning dirty fuel, no more contributing to asthma.”

PCBs were domestically manufactured for construction materials in the United States beginning in about 1930 until 1979, a time period that coincides with a boom in school construction to meet the demands of postwar birthrate growth. This increases the vulnerability of any school built or renovated before 1979.

Although the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency banned the manufacturing of PCBs over 40 years ago, PCBs are still of concern for school building because:

The durability of applications means that schools that were built or renovated before 1979 may still have PCBs used in a variety of applications like caulking, sealants, coatings, and electric components.
PCBs migrate, vaporize, and absorb into other materials and can be stored in our bodies for a long time, so prolonged and sustained exposure has a cumulative affect.
Studies show high-dose exposures can diminish learning, growth, immunity, and present other health hazards.

Today, Vice President Harris will provide a six-month progress report on the Biden-⁠Harris Action Plan for Building Better School Infrastructure, outlining a series of actions from across the Administration to upgrade our public schools with healthy, safe, sustainable facilities and transportation. In Seattle, Washington today, Vice President Harris and EPA Administrator Michael Regan will join schoolchildren, parents, district leaders, and community members to announce nearly $1 billion in rebate awards from President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to replace existing aging school bus fleets with clean buses.

Since the Action Plan was first announced in April 2022, the Administration has secured new historic legislative accomplishments that build on progress that’s been made to deliver safer, healthier, and more environmentally sustainable learning environments for America’s children, while saving school districts money, creating good jobs, and combatting climate change. In addition to the clean school bus rebate awards, other actions announced today include upgrading school infrastructure, supporting clean energy in rural schools, and improving indoor air quality.

WASHINGTON, D.C.— The Biden-Harris Administration, through the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), today released a Notice of Intent (NOI) announcing $80 million from President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, to make K-12 schools more energy efficient and lower their energy costs, including some of the nation’s highest-need schools. The funding is the first tranche of the Renew America’s Schools grant program created by the infrastructure law to provide schools critical energy infrastructure upgrades.  

Through the grant program, DOE will fund energy and health improvements in public K-12 schools across the country. Additionally, a new DOE prize program will help resource 25 high-need school districts with the training and tools needed to improve how their schools consume energy. Through President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, these investments will address the historic inequities of school facilities, reduce school energy costs, and improve health and learning outcomes for children and staff, while also supporting the promise of bringing good-paying jobs to the community.  

MARINE CORPS BASE HAWAII - The Office of Local Defense Community Cooperation (OLDCC), using funding from the Department of Defense (DOD) Public Schools on Military Installations (PSMI) Program, is set to award a $96 million grant to the Hawaii State Department of Education (HIDOE). The HIDOE will use this grant to replace Mokapu Elementary School, located aboard Marine Corps Base Hawaii (MCBH), in order to address the capacity and facility condition deficiencies that placed the school on the Deputy Secretary of Defense “Public Schools on Military Installations Priority List” at #33. This new facility will serve 975 military connected students in grades kindergarten through sixth.

The PSMI program, sanctioned by congressional authorization, provides funding to construct, renovate, repair or expand public schools located on military installations to address capacity and/or facility condition deficiencies as priorities by a Secretary of Defense-approved prioritized listing. This program of assistance is available by invitation only, based upon a school’s placement on the prioritized listing and the availability of appropriations.

STAMFORD — The plan to fix Stamford's school buildings will take 20 years and cost the city roughly $742 million.
Those were the figures presented by architectural firm SLAM Collaborative during a meeting of the school department's Long Term Facilities  Committee last week.
The numbers represent an increase from the total price tag of $540 million presented in February for a plan that previously called for a 12-year timeline.
But since then, there have been plenty of developments.
One of the biggest changes came in May when the state General Assembly passed a budgetary bill that included provisions to increase the reimbursement share Stamford receives for school construction projects. 
One provision granted an 80 percent state refund rate for a new Westhill High School. Another increased the state's contribution for school contributions to 60 percent for the next 25 years, much higher than the 20 percent rate the city received previously.
In all, the state is expected to fund about $766 million of the school department's 20-year plan.

While the future of school funding in Ohio beyond 2023 is dependent on the next state budget, State Reps. Jay Edwards (R-Nelsonville) and Shane Wilkin (R-Hillsboro) have crafted new legislation to increase equity in education in other ways.

The lawmakers' proposal, introduced earlier this month, would set aside $600 million to improve conditions for more than 58,000 students across 38 school districts in 18 Appalachian counties.

Known as the Accelerated Appalachian School Building Assistance Program, it would create a program under the Ohio Facilities Construction Commission, the agency that oversees infrastructure projects for institutions supported by the state, which includes public K-12 schools.

“For too long, Ohio has prioritized investment in students from cities over students in rural areas,” Edwards wrote in a statement. “The introduction of this legislation sends a message to leaders in Columbus that it is time we deliver equitable school facility investment to Appalachian Ohio."

ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST PARISH, La. (WVUE) - The Environmental Protection Agency is encouraging the state of Louisiana to shut down an elementary school in Reserve over toxic exposure it calls environmental discrimination.

The EPA said it has evidence that Black residents living near the Denka plant in LaPlace face an increased risk of cancer from a nearby chemical plant and that state officials have allowed air pollution to remain high and downplayed its threat.

Denka is the nation’s only emitter of chloroprene, a toxic volatile liquid byproduct from the creation of the synthetic rubber neoprene, and has been designated by the EPA as a likely carcinogenic.

The agency’s 56-page letter to Louisiana officials describes early findings of racial discrimination by two Louisiana departments involving the entire corridor between New Orleans and Baton Rouge, a plant that EPA said emits large amounts of a cancer-causing chemical and a proposed plastics complex.

Ribbon-cutting ceremonies at Clyde W. Needham Elementary School on Thursday afternoon brought to conclusion a years-long reconstruction project.

A crowd of approximately 100 people, including school board members, Lodi City Council members, school officials, District Superintendent Dr. Cathy Nichols-Washer, teachers, and members of the public looked on as the renovations were officially dedicated.

The Needham School band also played for the occasion.

About half the old buildings at the school were demolished in April of 2020 to make way for a new classroom building, a pre-school room, a new multi-purpose room, kitchen and fitness room, and a new drop-off area on Church Street with new concrete walkways.

In addition to all the new buildings, the project included new electrical mains and upgrades, a new fire alarm system, emergency lighting, a new public address and emergency communication system, plus other upgrades.

The improvement project was approved by the school board in 2018, which included the removal of some of the school’s portable classrooms. However, the board later decided to remove all 13 of them and replace them with 12 permanent classrooms.

PATERSON — About 545 classes in the city's public schools exceed state limits on student size, a problem local education officials attribute to fiscal constraints, rising enrollment, inadequate buildings and a shortage of teachers.

Eastside High School has the greatest number of overcrowded classes, with 200, according to a district report on class sizes as of Oct. 18. That includes 41 social studies classes at Eastside that exceed state limits, 39 science classes, 25 world language classes and 24 in math, the report shows.

Six of the district’s 10 high schools and 30 of 37 elementary schools have overcrowded classes, according to the report. The total number of overcrowded high school classes is 324, and there are 220 in city elementary schools. Paterson is New Jersey’s third-largest school district.

Ophelia Carter missed her first year of school because of covid-19 closures and her parents’ concerns for her health with no vaccination available for children under five. But in February, the 5-year-old received her first dose and was excited about starting kindergarten at her Eastern Kentucky school this fall.

Then came July. Devastating floods swept through Letcher County, where Ophelia lives, and other counties in the region, killing 40 people and damaging or destroying more than 10,000 homes. The floods also disrupted infrastructure, including power grids, water systems, and roads and bridges, for thousands more. The 25 affected school districts reopened weeks past their normal schedule, and damage to schools in the region may top $100 million, Gov. Andy Beshear (D) said in the days after the flooding.

“Everyone has a direct link to how awful this is,” Ophelia’s mother, Carrie Carter, said at a restaurant near their home. The restaurant, Heritage Kitchen, and the Carters’ home were barely spared from the rising water.

Hyde County Schools has been awarded $8.3 million to repair some of its Mattamuskeet facilities.

The award was announced at a special meeting Wednesday morning of the Hyde County commissioners and comes from the $300 million Needs Based Public School Capital Fund (NBPSCF) from the NC Department of Public Instruction, according to a press release from Hyde County Schools.

Hyde was one of nine schools statewide to receive money from this fund, which was established to assist counties with their critical public school building capital needs.

Grants from the NBPSCF are funded with revenue from the N.C. Education Lottery. Grants are available to eligible counties for construction of new school buildings and additions, repairs and renovations of existing school facilities.

Superintendent of Hyde County Schools Dr. Melanie Shaver explained the award to the commissioners, saying that the vision for these funds is to expand the Career and Technical Education Program capabilities in the Mattamuskeet School by creating the Hyde County Industrial Arts Center that will house a diesel shop, a welding shop, agricultural shop and carpentry and maintenance areas.

ASHEVILLE, N.C. (WLOS) — Asheville City Schools is working to address high-priority maintenance needs in several schools. Buncombe County’s School Capital Fund Commission has approved funding requests for several projects that will now go before the Buncombe County Commission for final approval.

“We’re fortunate to have a lot of really nice buildings in our district, and we’ve tried to prioritize the ones that needed the most repair,” Asheville City Schools Executive Director of Operations April Dockery said.

The School Capital Fund Commission approved $5,341,805 for an extensive renovation of the Asheville High School and SILSA auditorium. Missing tiles in the ceiling and water damage marks are some of the most noticeable signs of need in the auditorium.

“It’s been in dire need of repair for many years now, and it’s kind of the heartbeat of our school system, and our community accesses that quite frequently,” Dockery said.

Elizabeth Piercy’s second grade students have to dress in layers when they come to school. Stony Mill Elementary School in Pittsylvania County doesn’t have central air conditioning, meaning classroom temperatures can be wildly inconsistent. 
“A group sitting near the air conditioner might be colder, and everybody else might be just fine, but that group is freezing,” Piercy said. “But there’s nothing we can do about it because we can’t move the air conditioner, and we have to have it on.”
Piercy said she has to raise her voice to be heard over the rumbling of the window unit. And on windy days, students can watch the blinds move because so much air comes in through the windows, she said. 
“You can’t caulk the same windows but so many times over the years,” she said. 
Stony Mill was built in 1964, making it one of the oldest schools in Pittsylvania County. There aren’t enough classrooms for its students, so Stony Mill has five mobile units outside the main building, where some classes are taught, said principal Kim Haymore. 
This is a security concern, as students who need to use the restroom have to walk unsupervised back into the main school building, she said. 
This isn’t the only school in the county with these problems. And these are all issues that could be remedied by a 1% sales tax increase, a referendum that will appear on the ballot this year for the second time in Pittsylvania County.