Policies & Healthy Schools

Claire Barnett, Executive Director, Healthy Schools Network, Inc.

Yes, 2007 was a momentous year for major policy reforms to protect children and promote healthier schools nationwide. The national Coalition for Healthier Schools (APHA is a founding participant), coordinated by Healthy Schools Network, is fostering policy initiatives such as healthy and high performance school design, requiring green cleaning products in schools, improving school siting laws, and building environmental public health services to protect children from exposures in schools, being adopted in the states and nationally. 

The new High Performance Green Buildings Act of 2007, in the Energy Act passed by Congress and signed into law in December 2007 and shaped and supported by the Coalition, is a huge victory. Importantly, the law gives new authorizations to the U.S. Enivironmental Protection Agency --  to give grants to state agencies to create comprehensive plans on school environments, to create federal guidelines for the siting of schools, and, advised by CDC, to develop guidelines to promote children’s environmental health in schools.  

Green Seal, the preeminent nonprofit third party certifier of industrial cleaning products used by large facilities such as schools and government agencies, has seen its standard embraced by schools and municipalities around the country.  New York state passed the nation’s first law in 2005 requiring all public and private schools to use green cleaning products, then defined those as products certified by Green Seal or Terra Choice.  Illinois passed a similar law in 2007, actively supported by the Illinois Healthy Schools Campaign. Similar initiatives are being taken up by NGO’s and states, as a way to promote healthier indoor environments and to promote the health of teachers and custodial workers who have high rates of occupational asthma.

To accelerate the adoption of green cleaning policies and practices, a National Collaborative Work Group on Green Cleaning is being coordinated by Healthy Schools Network, first, to participate with Green Seal in updating its ‘green’ criteria for evaluating products, and second, to develop an ‘industry-free, customizable training toolkit’ for use by agencies, unions, districts, and NGO’s.  Now in field-testing, elements of the Collaborative’s “Cleaning for Health” toolkit were presented at EPA’s IAQ Tools for School Symposium, to state agencies in Florida, to districts and agencies across New England, and to the national Coalition for Healthier Schools. The information is already in demand in a dozen states.

In short, 2007 was a momentous year of root reforms that will yield long-term results that are truly protective of children. 

For more information; Healthy Schools Network --  www.healthyschools.org ; for the National Coalition for Healthier Schools -- http://www.healthyschools.org/coalition.html ; for the Healthy and High Performance Schools Act -- http://www.healthyschools.org/documents/EnergyAct2007-HHPS_text.pdf ; and for Green Seal— www.greenseal.org .