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Lakewood Elementary, a Title I Public School in Durham, North Carolina - like so many others right now - is working hard to prepare for the return of students. In less than a week, schools will open at full-capacity for the first time in 17 months. At the same time, the Delta variant is causing an uptick in Covid cases, meaning that keeping kids safe is now an urgent priority - especially as vaccinations are not yet available to elementary school kids.
We want to ensure the safety of our staff and students, and make sure our Bulldogs have everything they need to learn and teach under these uncertain conditions. We are grateful that Lakewood students will be masked and use grant-funded outdoor equipment for eating & learning when possible. Buying portable air purifiers for every classroom at Lakewood is the most effective step we as parents can take to help keep the students and teachers safe.* Using guidance from the Harvard School of Public Health Safe Buildings site (https://schools.forhealth.org/) we have figured out what level of air purifier we need for Lakewood classrooms (about 1100 sq. feet).
Our goal is to buy:
22 HEPA-filter air purifiers & 22 replacement filters for homeroom classes, Art & Music.
6 medium-size air purifiers & 3 small office-size air purifiers for resource teachers who provide pull-out for small groups (EC, Speech, Counseling, Intervention, ESL, AIG)
Extension cords & covers so each unit can be placed in a way to work effectively & safely.
Materials to create box fan air purifiers for the large spaces in the Library & Gym.
(Note: this is an updated target goal from our original post. See below for more details….)
Combined with the central systems HVAC, this will clean the air in each classroom 4 times per hour, lowering risk of transmission by almost 90%. These air purifiers will provide safer classrooms all year-long and lower stress levels for everybody, so that teachers can teach and kids can learn.
Your donation helps fill gaps in public school funding and provided needed ventilation at the best cost we could find. We appreciate your support of our school and our students! Together, our donations, regardless of whether the amount is $10, $100 or $1000, will make a big difference at Lakewood Elementary!
(This fundraiser is being organized by Delaney Susi and Narendra Ghosh, Lakewood Parents, with the approval of the school. This is because we want to get these items in place right away and because official PTA funds cannot be spent until the budget is set and approved, which won't happen until mid-September. Receipts for all purchases will be published to this page, along with pictures of air purifiers purchased. Please do not hesitate to reach out with questions or concerns.)
Delaney Susi: [email redacted]
Narendra Ghosh: [email redacted]
*The CDC recently published a case study showing the effectiveness of portable air cleaners, particularly when combined with universal masking. Portable HEPA air cleaners can reduce exposure to simulated SARS-CoV-2 aerosols in indoor environments, especially when combined with universal masking. We are following the Harvard School of Public Health's Risk Reduction for Opening Schools by choosing the most cost-effective air purifier that would be effective in our classrooms.
UPDATED TARGET GOAL!
We reached our initial goal of installing air purifiers in all of the main classrooms!!!
This is an amazing achievement that's made a real difference.
With kids back at school now we also realize there's more we need to do to keep all of our kids and teachers safe throughout the whole school day. We are hoping to raise $4,000 more to provide for the following:
- The art and music classrooms need the same large air purifiers, especially because so many different students are in those classes each day.
- There are six medium-size rooms used for pull-out classes like ESL, EC, & support services. We can use purifiers that are about half the cost for these rooms.
- There are three small rooms for resource teachers such as speech and counseling. We can use small desktop purifiers that are about $100.
- For the main classrooms, we need extension cords and cord covers so we can place the purifiers in the middle of the rooms rather than against the walls. They can clean much more air if they're in the right spot.
- The gym and library are large spaces so we need a more affordable option: Corsi-Rosenthal Boxes. These are DIY air purifiers built out of cheap box fans and household filters, but they work incredibly well. (Check out https://cleanaircrew.org/boxfanfilterfaq/.) We'll get materials to build about 5 of these.
We deeply appreciate the swift help of so many- from friends & family to local business owners to anonymous donors!
If you can donate again & spread the word we would greatly appreciate it.
Thank you for supporting our Lakewood community and for keeping our kids safe!