Healthy Schools Campaign

Connecting the Issues of Food and Global Climate Change

by Rochelle Davis, HSC Founding Executive Director

Anna Lappe  (a bestselling author and advocate for sustainability and food justice) has just launched a new website on the connection between food and global climate change as she researches a new book, “Eat the Sky: Food, Farming and Climate Change.” 

Given Healthy Schools Campaign’s dual priorities on environmental issues and food and fitness, it is interesting to see how these two issue become connected. 

For us, the connection has been made around our work on healthy and high performing school construction.  For those of you familiar with the term “healthy and high performing,” you know that “healthy” generally refers to  healthy indoor air and “high performing” refers to energy efficiency.  The guidance document that we worked on with more than 40 stakeholders here in Illinois integrates a broader notion of health by incorporating recommendations that include kitchen facilities that can produce healthy food.   

Anna Lappe makes the connection between our two program areas even stronger when she connects food production and distribution to climate change.  We will look forward to reading her book.

At the Front Lines of School Health

by Mark Bishop, HSC Deputy Director

This past weekend I was asked to speak at a public hearing held by SEIU on healthy school environments.  SEIU represents janitorial workers and school food service staff in many schools. Given our commitment to both green cleaning and healthy food, I was interested in hearing their members’ perspectives on these two issues.

What I heard that day was both inspiring and demoralizing.  It was inspiring to hear story after story of dedicated individuals, passionate about their work and about helping kids.  On the other hand, the stories I heard highlighted the flaws that exist in the system -- a system where schools don't have enough money to operate, where margins are so thin that contractors are forced to minimize labor costs, where our political leaders struggle to find money to fairly and adequately fund our schools.

Some of the stories that were shared included:

• The school food worker who said she was told to lie to students about the availability of fresh fruit because they didn’t have enough staff to prepare the food for students.
• The school food worker who was asked for a seconds by a student who said this was the only meal he’d eat that day -- and how she was scared that she’d be fired if she gave it to him
• The janitor who told stories about all the co-workers who were rushed to the hospital with respiratory ailments -- without health insurance -- because of exposures to toxic cleaning chemicals at school
• The janitor who said that the school's contracting company won’t provide the safety protection that is required with the cleaning chemicals they use
• The school food worker who said she serves food to students even when she is sick because she has no sick-time pay and can’t afford to miss a single minimum wage paycheck
• The janitor who was told he was responsible for cleaning an additional area after a co-worker was fired but was given no additional time to clean it -- leading to areas going uncleaned

I heard speaker after passionate speaker, all of them dedicated to helping children, all of them dedicated to making a better life for themselves.

Our janitors don’t just sweep up trash:  they are an important part of the health staff of our schools. By cleaning properly, they keep our kids from getting sick.

Our school food workers are not just the proverbial lunch lady:  they are parents and community members who take pride in giving our kids the best meal possible.

But if school staff aren't treated with the respect they deserve, if they aren’t provided with the training and tools they require, school health will suffer and we’ll continue to fight an uphill battle to help our students achieve.

Dangerous Lesson: Chemical Spill Highlights Need for Green Cleaning

by Claris Olson, HSC Environmental Health Specialist

The Chicago Tribune recently reported a cleaning chemical spill at a school in Country Club Hills, Ill. The spill sent 24 students and two teachers to the hospital; 400 students were evacuated and the school was temporarily closed.

Unfortunately, it is only through accidents like these, the ones that make headline news, that we’re alerted to the significant hazards of conventional cleaning chemicals. 

Luckily, we do not see evacuations caused by chemical spills happening on a regular basis; but that doesn’t mean that the indoor air is clean or healthy. 

We have come to associate the smell of bleach, ammonia or pine with what we think of as "clean." But the reality is these and most conventional cleaning chemicals are toxic. Even when used properly, they are respiratory, skin, and or eye irritants.  Some conventional cleaning products can cause cancer and are suspected reproductive toxins.  Mixing chemicals can produce a poisonous gas, as it did at the school that had to be evacuated in Country Club Hills.

Advances in product formulations have resulted in the development of green cleaning chemicals that are cost-comparable and just as effective as conventional cleaners but are safer for health and the environment.

Using these green cleaning products protects students and staff from emergencies such as the chemical spill; it also protects them on a daily basis from respiratory irritants (particularly important to the millions of children who suffer from asthma) and the cumulative effects of chemicals linked to long-term health problems. The best way to ensure the product is safe is to use third party certified products such as Green Seal, Environmental Choice, or Design for the Environment.  And always follow the manufacturer’s directions.

In light of cases like these, green cleaning seems like such a no-brainer that it makes you wonder why everyone is not using green cleaning practices. Perhaps the best explanation came from Superintendent Wendell Chu of New York, who explained that school administrators have so many pressing issues to work on every day that it took a law requiring green cleaning for him to realize how much sense it makes. With the law in place, he was able to make green cleaning a priority. 

As green cleaning laws are being implemented in Illinois and New York, students and staff will no longer be facing the daily adverse health effects associated with conventional cleaning chemicals and will be safe from the danger of emergency situations such as a chemical spill.

In the other 48 states without green cleaning legislation, we can provide tools such as The Quick and Easy Guide to Green Cleaning in Schools to help facility managers understand the need for green cleaning not only for the wellbeing of their students and staff, but also for an effective, affordable and sustainable approach to cleaning that does not harm the environment.

Everyone deserves to send their children to a school where students can breathe the air without having to worry about it making them sick.  Even though green cleaning in schools is not required by law everywhere, breathing clean air in school should be every child’s right.

Schools Need School Nurses

Today we have a guest entry from Martha Dewey Bergren, HSC Board member and a clinical assistant professor at the University of Illinois-Chicago College of Nursing.

Last month, the Chicago Tribune ran an article about 7-year-old Sophie Elder's struggle to get support for her health-care needs in school ("Girl, Interrupted," March 4). The story describes Sophie’s struggles as a child with diabetes -- she needs blood tests throughout the day -- and her family’s efforts to find support for Sophie when she is in school.

However, the story did not mention the obvious solution: a school nurse.

The health care needs of all children are important, whether they have diabetes, seizures, anaphylactic food allergies, asthma or the accidents and injuries that occur every day at school.

In the absence of a registered nurse with school-nurse certification, lay persons, secretaries or other school personnel are expected to administer medications, including injections, and perform other nursing procedures unsupervised and without the appropriate training.

Many school districts staff each building with a school nurse, but there's no national standard specifying a nurse-to-student ratio. (The National Association of School Nurses recommends minimum ratios of nurses to students depending on the needs of the student populations.) And Illinois is not one of about a dozen states that have some guidelines regarding the number of school nurses in districts or schools.

Why doesn't Illinois think the health of all children in school is important enough to have a school nurse in every building? It is important for parents to investigate who provides care in their child's school. And it is time for Illinois to move forward with a nurse-to-student ratio that will protect the health of all children.

HSC Criticizes Cook County Budget Cuts

by Rochelle Davis, HSC Executive Director

Earlier this month, I wrote with the hope that the 2007 Cook County budget would maintain funding for school-based health clinics, which are important places for educating students about healthy lifestyles and managing chronic conditions.

Unfortunately, the budget approved by the Cook County Board last week eliminates six school-based clinics and four neighborhood clinics, while also slashing funding for two additional school-based clinics.

"A lot of time students come in and they're in dire need of an asthma pump to help ease the pain. Having these cutbacks will downgrade our health centers," Jeffrey Riley, a student patient, told CBS2 Chicago.

A recent community-level study from Sinai Health System shows dramatically higher rates of childhood obesity and asthma in Latino and African-American communities. In Humboldt Park, for example, approximately 28 percent of children experience asthma and 62 percent of children are overweight or obese. In West Town, approximately 73 percent of children are overweight or obese. This compares with a national average of 17 percent.

It is a real tragedy that the Cook County Board failed to prioritize children's health.