When temperatures skyrocketed in Denver during late August 2019, classroom teachers attempted a mix of creative solutions to help their students cope: closing the blinds during the day, turning off the lights, and even asking students to come up with their own room-cooling experiments. But with unairconditioned classrooms reaching up to 98°F, it wasn’t enough to keep kids learning.
That level of stifling heat can make it hard for students to stay engaged. It also poses a real threat to their health — especially in schools without a full-time nurse on staff. That August, a group of schoolteachers organized a rally outside the headquarters of Denver Public Schools to protest the hazardously hot conditions.
“Teachers tend to be martyrs,” Lisa Yemma, a teacher at Slavens K-8 School, told Chalkbeat Colorado. “We say, ‘This totally sucks, but we’re going to do it anyway because it’s for the kids.’ But at this point, we are risking the health and safety of the kids.”
The issue is widespread in Colorado’s capital city: 55 Denver public schools lack air conditioning, and that’s a big improvement from a decade ago. Over the past decade, Denver voters approved nearly $90 million in municipal bonds to pay for heat mitigation in schools. The district says that in 2020, voters overwhelmingly approved a $795 million bond package that included a planned investment of $128 million over the next three years for air conditioning in 24 Denver public schools.
“In considering the trade offs, there were many projects in areas such as critical maintenance, capacity, quality learning environments and others that did not receive funding through the bond,” Jim Carpenter, interim chief operating officer/chief financial officer for Denver Public Schools, wrote in an email. According to Carpenter, installing air conditioning in the remaining 31 schools is expected to cost an additional $138 million.
As a stopgap, the district proposed a revised school calendar, starting later in the year. But the proposal could cause another dilemma for working families, as most summer camps and childcare providers won’t continue their programs past the usual start date.
In order to prevent the spread of COVID-19, the district committed $4.9 million to air-conditioning upgrades and ventilation repairs for the fall of 2020. Climate change will speed up the process as well: a recent report from the University of Colorado found that “all climate projections indicate that heat waves will substantially increase in frequency and severity in Colorado as the summer climate becomes warmer.”
Denver’s teachers are contending with this reality and the impacts it will have on their classrooms. “In the future, as the climate gets warmer, this is an issue we do need to solve,” Yemma said.
Denver Public Schools will incur some of the highest cooling costs in the country. To read more about all of Colorado’s schools, check out the Colorado state page.