Air Quality Sensor for My School

The 2017 northern California fires caused widespread destruction and sent huge plumes of toxic smoke into the air. The smoke caused schools in my area to shut down for over a week, due to the poor air quality.

I am an eighth grader in Sonoma County. I want to raise $250 to purchase and install a permanent air quality sensor at my school, so that we will be aware of future bad air quality problems, local or far away, because smoke can travel hundreds of miles.

Poor air quality is bad for your health, especially for children and the elderly. When air pollution is bad, it can irritate your eyes, nose, and throat. In the short term, it can cause shortness of breath, aggravate asthma and other problems with your lungs, and even affect your heart and cardiovascular system, especially in children and the elderly. Breathing polluted air for long periods of time can cause more serious health problems, like chronic respiratory disease, lung cancer, heart disease, and even damage to the brain, nerves, liver, or kidneys, which leads to premature death.


The Purple Air sensor I want to buy.

There are not enough air quality monitors in the united states. In fact there are only 3 EPA monitors in my area. A company called Purple Air has created inexpensive air quality sensors to solve this problem.

Purple Air sensors use lasers to measure the air quality by reflecting off particles floating in the air. Measuring the air quality won't solve the air pollution problem, but it will give us better information about the current air quality.

The air quality sensor will cost about $250 with shipping. Extra money that I receive from this fundraiser will go towards buying more air quality sensors to give to other schools.


Thank you for visiting my GoFundMe page,
I would greatly appreciate it if you could donate to help install an air quality sensor at our school.


EPA's air quality monitors in my area.