Safe Schools Irene Ruth Wilkenfeld

We are in the midst of a silent epidemic, an unrecognized emergency, an educational "ecotastrophe." It has little to do with finances, curricula, teacher training or campus overcrowding. It has everything to do with the environmental health safety of our school facilities. Few parents are aware that sending their children to school can be like playing a dangerous game of Russian roulette; that school can be a hazardous place for kids and teachers alike.

Each day, as the bright yellow caravans of school buses take to the road for the start of a new school day, our nation's young scholars and their teachers face many unsuspecting exposures to a hidden cluster of "subliminal stressors," that undermine their health, mood, behavior and learning ability, and contribute to the sick school syndrome.

• Problem Classroom Contaminants
• Symptoms of Sick School Syndrome
• Health Statistics
• Sick School Syndrome Statistics
• Workshop on Safe Schools
• Reading Resources
• Sick School Syndrome: in the News
• Favorite Websites
• Sick School Syndrome: Open Letters
• Bill of Rights: Environmental Quality in our Schools

"For too long, we have regarded schools as safe, clean places to work. But today, we know that workers in schools and the students they serve are subjected to safety and health hazards that threaten their lives."
(Thomas Y. Hobart, Jr., president of New York state United Teachers)

Our education system is in a state of crisis. For more than a decade, we've been deluged with reports documenting the failures of our public schools. Educators have been unsuccessful in trying to reform the system. One key factor in the educational equation has been overlooked! Virtually no attention has been focused on THE SICK SCHOOL SYNDROME which may trigger chemical injury and hypersensitivity reactions and adversely impact a child's ability to learn. We are sabotaging our children's success in school with our ignorance, our inertial and our silence. Until school-based environmental exposures are substantially curtailed, our nation's youngsters will continue to fall short of our educational goals.

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