For school leaders across the country, the past year has been full of “firsts.” There was the first mass shift to remote learning due to a pandemic. Many teachers implemented new learning technologies for the first time. And for Susan Enfield, the superintendent of Highline Public Schools, just over 10 miles south of Seattle, another “first” came at the end of June: the first time in her career she has ever had to close schools due to extreme heat.
Just a few weeks ago, parts of Washington, Oregon, and Idaho suffered several days of record-breaking heat. And although temperatures in the triple digits are new, the region is no stranger to severe climate conditions, including droughts and wildfires, especially recently. For some school and district leaders, this searing heatwave was the latest reminder of a reality they have been reckoning with for years: the changing climate is affecting their schools and students.
“I have many students who are part of multiple families living in a single-family residence or a single-family apartment,” says Jon Pede, principal of Poynter Middle School in Hillsboro, Oregon. “It occurred to me about a day or two after [the extreme temperatures began]: how are families coping with this heat?”
On June 28, Seattle hit an all-time record high of 108 degrees. In Portland, the temperature rose to 115 degrees. Around both metro areas, schools closed, planes were grounded, and infrastructure buckled and melted. New research describes these conditions as a “one-in-a-thousand-year event” and says they would be virtually impossible without climate change.
In some ways, the Pacific Northwest is especially vulnerable to this weather. As Insider reported, many of the region’s cities have the lowest rates of air conditioning in the country. In Seattle, for example, only 44 percent of households are air conditioned. Plus, agriculture is a significant source of income for these families, says Pede, and that means some students’ close relatives are at higher risk of on-the-job heatstroke or other injuries.
School Vulnerabilities
The shift to remote learning under the pandemic and continued worries over the spread of COVID-19 also kept students away from climate-controlled school buildings. Enfield and some of her colleagues across the region closed outdoor summer learning sessions and offered teachers, administrators, and staff who manage them flexible hours and virtual trainings to keep them out of the worst of the heat.
And for the education workers who did have to come to school, not all were guaranteed air conditioning. Some schools still lack that infrastructure. The Washington state chapter of the American Federation of Teachers requested improvements to facilities in a statement posted to their Facebook on July 7.
“…extreme heat is a workers’ rights issue for education workers who often work in poorly-ventilated classrooms, kitchens, libraries, and busses. Many schools in Washington state lack cooling in classrooms.”
Cities across the Pacific Northwest opened cooling stations during the heatwave and school leaders like Pede sent messages to their communities directing families to free local resources. Still, the principal says most of his community was caught off guard by the extreme weather, and he wonders how his school could better serve families should this heat come back.
“Our schools are becoming centers of communities rather than just educational centers. At Poynter, we opened a food pantry two years ago... and as it was taking off through COVID, I started to realize the needs of families,” he says. In hindsight, he reflects on questions he could have asked earlier on, including, “Do we need to provide more water? We had empty schools with air conditioning running. Why didn't we open them?”
Instructional Planning for Extreme Weather
Pede also underscored the importance of providing educators with the tools and encouragement to incorporate discussions of climate change into their instructional planning. A quickly changing environment can be disorienting to some students, and teaching lessons that unpack exactly why and how the weather is changing is a way to build student resiliency.
“The quality of life for our kids gets diminished every time we don't talk about [climate change] . . . and eventually that will affect their learning,” says Pede.
Enfield agrees. To her, learning about climate change is personal. Her father almost lost his house in Napa Valley from a wildfire a few years ago, and she says she has been confronted with the realities of a changing environment ever since. If there is some wisdom she could provide to district leaders who haven’t yet faced similar climate-related challenges, it would be to learn from what is happening in her community.
“What I would say to fellow educators is, use the experiences of those of us living it as your teaching and as your lesson on what you do differently,” she says. “I'm a former high school teacher and the best teaching and learning happens from real-life experiences and examples.”
“The quality of life for our kids gets diminished every time we don't talk about [climate change] . . . and eventually that will affect their learning."
Proactive Leadership
While communities in the Northwest may be feeling the effects of this heatwave more acutely right now, the reality is that climate change will likely fuel educational challenges everywhere. That means education leaders need to start thinking proactively about how to protect their schools and students. Enfield says she’s considering preparing schools for heatwaves in the same way she would prepare them for earthquakes, including making sure every campus has stores of water and other necessary supplies. Fortunately, the pandemic led her schools to improve their HVAC systems for better air circulation, which will also more efficiently keep students and teachers cool.
“School districts, we've learned, especially this year, have to be prepared for anything,” she says.
