Roselyon School in Par Cornwall now destroyed by fire

 

A Cornish school has become the latest victim of arson attacks on school buildings. Although no longer used for educational purposes the building served the community as a holding space for recycled furniture and household equipment, which would ultimately benefit less well off members.

The fire was reported at 11 pm on Friday the 27^th of December and residents were reported as using every means at their disposal to contain the fire and keep it from reaching nearby residential properties. One resident said: “There were residents using buckets of water, throwing it over sheds and the hedge to keep it damped down. One young man with a garden hose was trying to keep down and away from houses and sheds until the firemen turned up.”

 

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Five fire crews backed up by support vehicles Crews from Fowey, St Austell, Lostwithiel and St Dennis along with a whole-time officer and an incident command unit from Launceston and operational support vehicle from St Austell were at the scene until the early hours finally bringing the incident under control at around 2 am.

In 2010 it was reported that in the previous two years there had been over 3000 incidents of arson attacks on school buildings, at the time Michael Gove who was then the shadow schools secretary was quoted as saying “The large number of arson attacks, on top of all the other problems in schools, is deeply worrying.”

The current rate for deliberately started school fires is suggested to be 2700 per year.

Zurich Municipal who insure 50% of the UK school buildings carried out an inspection spanning two years and found that 67% of English Schools were rated as having poor fire protection provision, only 5% were classed as excellent, compared to a much higher 29% excellent rating for Scottish Schools.

This difference may be attributed to the fact that in Scotland all new schools and those undergoing major refurbishment have a legal directive to fit sprinklers. In England it is advised but no mandatory. Fewer that one in six new schools in England have been built with a sprinkler system installed.

The Zurich inspections included evaluating the overall combustibility of the construction as well as fire detection systems and smoking controls. As a result of the findings Zurich wrote to the Government in September 19 calling for urgent action to address the problem.

Tilden Watson, the head of education at Zurich, said: “A change in government legislation to make sprinklers in schools mandatory not only protects children while they are in school, it often contains the fire to the room it starts in when it happens out of school hours.

“Not only does this minimise the level of damage caused, it also negates the aftermath, which often leads to months or even years of disruption for children’s education while the school is repaired.”

Andy Dark, the assistant general secretary of the Fire Brigades Union, said: “We’ve made it clear in the past that newly built schools and other high-risk buildings should have sprinkler systems and we fully support Zurich Municipal’s call on the government to change the law to make them mandatory.

“Ideally, sprinklers would be fitted in all schools of whatever age and size. Sprinklers can assist in limiting the spread of fire, the damage it will cause and giving occupants additional time to escape, as well as reducing the risks faced by fire-fighters attending the incident.”

 

 

The Health and Cost Benefits of Flicker-Free Lighting

By John Davenport

Several years ago, the Nordonia Hills City School District near Cleveland, Ohio, was looking to implement an energy conservation program. When one of the district’s schools, Rushwood Elementary School, began to study the available options, its administrators considered a number of factors—including the fact that the fluorescent lighting long in use had proven disruptive to some of their special-needs students. The decision was made to install flicker-free LED lighting, which could be easily retrofitted into Rushwood’s existing light fixtures. Following the retrofit, differences were noticed immediately across the school: teachers described the LED light quality as crisper, clearer and brighter, with words on paper easier to read; one teacher reported getting fewer headaches; a special-needs teacher noted a more “mellow feel” in her classroom; and the district reduced its total electric bill by about 11 percent.

Rushwood is just one of an increasing number of success stories across the educational landscape involving the installation of flicker-free LED lighting—an innovation with a wide range of advantages over the traditional fluorescent lights that have illuminated educational institutions for decades. For decision makers involved in the construction and renovation of primary and secondary schools as well as colleges and universities, this option represents a key opportunity. Evidence exists that the flicker and spiky spectrum of traditional fluorescent lighting and early-generation LEDs can be detrimental to the health of those in classrooms and other school facilities, whereas flicker-free, full-spectrum LEDs offer a superior option, all while significantly slashing maintenance costs. Not only can the retrofit be performed without hassle; LED bulbs have an extremely long lifetime, which translates into sharply reduced maintenance costs.

 

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Flicker-free LED lighting offers numerous health and cognitive benefits

What are some of the potential health benefits of flicker-free LED lighting? Pioneering controlled studies conducted by Arnold Wilkins of the University of Essex found the occurrence of headaches in office workers who sat beneath fluorescent lighting all day could be reduced by as much as half following a significant reduction in flicker. In addition to dizziness, migraines, eyestrain and fatigue, it has also been shown that seizures can be triggered by the flicker of traditional fluorescent lighting in individuals with photosensitive epilepsy. And while fluorescent bulbs contain mercury—a material that can present a serious safety risk for students if it comes in contact with lungs or skin—LED bulbs do not. Further, in the long term, the ultraviolet (UV) light generated by fluorescent bulbs can contribute to cataract formation and even macular degeneration, with young students especially at risk from the hazards of UV light. All these drawbacks can be avoided through the use of flicker-free LED lighting.

Along with these benefits, flicker-free LED lighting holds the potential to boost the quality of classroom learning and productivity. This is a natural consequence of the fact that students can concentrate more intently—and for longer periods of time—under this type of illumination. The full spectrum and constant irradiance generated by flicker-free LED lighting contribute to greater illumination and sharper color contrast, which in turn can enhance the quality of learning. Such improvements in learning and behavior may be most striking in the population of students with autism, due to their visual hypersensitivity, as well as those with other learning disabilities, as shown, for example in studies by Alexandria Kappel at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. The full-spectrum light from LED (but not fluorescent) lighting, which matches that from the sun, can also promote a healthier sleep-wake cycle in students.

Nor do the advantages of flicker-free LED lighting end at the classroom door; they can also improve the quality of the student experience in gymnasiums and shop classes. For example, under fluorescent lights with a high flicker rate, a basketball thrown across a gym can display a distracting, near-stroboscopic effect. And for those using lathes in metalworking and woodworking classes, the decreased visibility that results from the flicker of fluorescent lighting can pose a safety risk that can be avoided with flicker-free LED lighting.

Significant cost benefits can result from flicker-free LED lighting

In conjunction with these advantages, flicker-free LED lighting can offer significant maintenance cost savings and ease of installation. Converting from fluorescent lighting to LED lighting is increasingly being recognized as a key contributor to environmental sustainability. It is estimated that there are 12 billion fluorescent sockets worldwide; retrofitting all of them with LED lights has the potential to reduce electricity consumption by 960 billion kilowatt-hours globally, the equivalent of removing 679 million tons of CO2 per year. Various school districts have reported savings in the millions of dollars as a result of retrofitting their fixtures with flicker-free LED lighting. Manufacturers of flicker-free LED lighting provide retrofit kits that can be utilized either by school maintenance staff or by third parties.

In addition, the emergence of building Internet-of-Things (“IoT”), leveraged upon rapidly evolving software, electronics, sensor and cloud technologies, will enable LED lighting systems to serve as the hub of connectivity to manage and control IoT devices across school buildings and campuses, thereby substantially optimizing building energy efficiency, improving building performances and elevating the student and faculty experience.

To date, the health and economic advantages of retrofitting with flicker-free LED lighting have been recognized and implemented by more than 230 leading educational institutions, ranging from the University of Minnesota and Yale University to Penn State University and Ohio State University, as well as numerous school districts across the country.

Considering the array of health, learning and economic benefits it offers, flicker-free LED lighting represents a bold advance that is well worth assessing by all stakeholders in the area of school construction, renovation and retrofit.

John Davenport is Chief Scientist at Energy Focus, Inc., an industry-leading innovator of energy-efficient LED lighting technologies and solutions.    

 

Source: School Construction News 

 

A snapshot survey of 670 members of the National Education Union highlights the challenges facing schools and colleges in ensuring their buildings are well maintained and provide a safe and decent environment for teaching and learning

This survey reflects on a period of real-terms cuts in education, since 2015, which have put a severe squeeze on the ability of schools and colleges to afford repairs.

This survey was conducted just days after the Department for Education announced a £400m investment pot that schools and colleges can apply to draw upon for building repairs, but with the proviso that this only applies to academies and sixth form colleges. This comes after the scrapping of Building Schools for the Future in 2010, cancelling 700 building projects at a stroke – very many of them local-authority-maintained. Today’s survey clearly demonstrates that just within the last four years, the state of schools and colleges has taken a turn for the worse.

Headlines

• 47% of members said that their school or college buildings were not fit for purpose, with 65% blaming school funding cuts as the reason why.
• Over a fifth (21%) said that parts or all of their building have had to be closed because of disrepair over the past five years.
• 22% agreed that the state of their school/college buildings leads to an unsafe environment for pupils and staff.
• A quarter (26%) confirmed they are delaying turning on the heating for winter in their school/college.
• 35% said that the situation had changed for their worse in their school/college for buildings, facilities and maintenance since 2015, with just 13% seeing an improvement.
• The main issues raised were classrooms that are too hot or cold (74%), leaking ceilings/roofs (44%), crumbling walls/holes in walls (31%), and damp (21%). Members also noted poor ventilation (36%), electrical problems (17%) and faulty boilers/heaters (19%).

“Air conditioning broken for two years in computer room.”

“Birds getting in through holes in roof, holes in walls bring picked at by generations of students.”

“New build constantly postponed for years so old buildings still in use and not fit for purpose.”

“The new building has been built cheaply. The walls move and in winter are freezing, in summer too hot.”

“When it rains heavily, water floods my classroom and it comes through the fire escape. Water also comes through the roof.”

“My classroom roof leaks, and I have to have a bucket – textbooks and exercise books have been wrecked.”

“We also have some classrooms without ceilings.”

“Boilers that only work some of the time. Extraction fans that don’t work.”

“There is simply no money left for school repairs or improvements.”

“Used to be high school for 300 pupils now part of school with 1200 pupils. Stairs get jammed and are unsafe. Some mobile classrooms in use should be condemned.”

Asbestos 

The survey also serves as a reminder of the ongoing presence of asbestos in our schools. 86% of schools contain asbestos, yet today’s survey finds that just 21% of teachers – one fifth – were aware they were working in a school with asbestos.

“We know we have asbestos in our school but despite repeated requests we are not told where.”

“We currently don’t have properly working fire alarms as these were renovated over summer but the builders wouldn’t drill into any walls as they’re all asbestos.”

“Science block just shut down because of asbestos.”

The National Education Union, as part of the Joint Union Asbestos Committee, has called upon successive governments to take action on asbestos. Schools, parents and children deserve nothing less than a detailed national survey of the extent, type and condition of asbestos in schools. The government’s line has been that it is safer to manage asbestos than to remove it, but this is simply untenable. At least 319 teachers have died from mesothelioma since 1980, and 205 of those deaths have occurred since 2001. Deaths average at 17 per year, up from three per year during 1980-85.

Reacting to the survey, Kevin Courtney, joint general secretary of the National Education Union, said:

“It is quite intolerable that schools and colleges are having to forego building repairs and maintenance for years due to a lack of funding. Our children and young people deserve to be taught in buildings that are fit for purpose. It is simply not good enough that for so many children and staff, leaking ceilings and rotting windows and crumbling walls are their daily environment.

“This disastrous trajectory of decay has gone on long enough. Promises, and not just empty ones, need to be made by political parties as to how this will be resolved. We look forward to hearing serious commitments from each of the political parties, so that voters can make an informed decision. If you value education, you must vote for education.”

Source: Education Executive

We look at two school roof problems, one old and one new

 

An ‘old’ school roof collapses

 

A Gwynedd primary school will be closed for two weeks because part of its roof fell in .

Children at Ysgol Brynaerau, Pontllyfni, Gwynedd arrived at school on Monday morning, after their half-term break, only to be sent immediately back home.

Inspections on the roof have revealed that it is potentially unsafe in several places, and the school is now likely to be closed for a fortnight.

The ceiling in the hall and both classrooms will need to be replaced.

The children will be taught at Ysgol Talysarn during the period of the closure, and transport will be laid on for them.

Yesterday, when the school was first closed, Robert Jones, 60, from Capel Uchaf , questioned whether his daughter Victoria and other youngsters could have been in danger if they had been in lessons at the time the roof began to give way.

He said: “My daughter said she could see where it had moved, so I believe the roof has partially collapsed.

“It is an old school building, Victorian with a modern annexe on the side.”

“What if it had collapsed with the children inside?

He said the school did not say what caused the collapse, or if they were aware of the danger.

 

Source: North Wales Live

 

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A ‘new’ school roof not fit for purpose

 

Nearly £1m worth of cash has been signed off to fix a primary school’s leaky roof, which has been blamed for disrupting children’s education.

Sandal Magna Community Academy got a new school building in 2010, but its roof has been in a state of disrepair ever since, with the school having to be repeatedly closed for short periods in recent years.

Two contractors tasked with fixing it went bust, councillors were told on Tuesday, while a third company did not complete the job after the school ran out of cash for it.

Now, Wakefield Council has put up £850,000 to repair the roof. Although academies are funded by the government and their own private sponsors, the local authority has had to stump up because the problem started when the school was under its control.

Speaking at a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday morning, the council’s Cabinet member for children, Margaret Isherwood, said: “The school has had five closures since 2016, and on one occasion it was shut for three days.

“It’s not good for the children involved.

The school became an academy in 2013.

“The closures are becoming more necessary and more regular.

“It’s vitally important this work is done. We have a responsibility, even though its now an academy, because the work was done while it was a (local authority) maintained school.

“There’s no other option but to replace the roof so that the children can continue their education.”

Wakefield Council did consider taking legal action against some of the professionals tasked with fixing the roof, but decided against the move over fears it may be too costly and unsuccessful.

The local authority will apply for a grant from the Department of Education in the hope of having the cash refunded.

 

Source: Wakefield Express