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August 26, 2024
Over the weekend, the chiller at the high school overloaded and stopped working. It has been working fine all month, and we have been checking it and classrooms for weeks, so this is terrible timing. It has been running all day today, but it takes the system around 36 hours to catch up. This has resulted in very warm temperatures throughout the building this afternoon. With lows predicted in the mid 70's tonight, and a heat advisory tomorrow, we are concerned that we will not be able to cool the spaces down enough to create a reasonable learning environment, especially once we fill the building with 1800 kids and 100 staff members.
Given this sequence of events, unfortunately, we need to postpone the first day of school for the high school only, and start Wednesday instead.
All other district buildings will start school as scheduled tomorrow, as the cooling systems across the rest of the district are fully operational. So we look forward to seeing students tomorrow at Beagle, Hayes, Delta Center, Holbrook, Wacousta, and Willow Ridge. Neff, Delta Mills, and Adventure Club programming will begin as normal tomorrow too.
I am exceedingly frustrated and disappointed, but I cannot see how the temperatures will be conducive to learning in the building tomorrow, and I do not want to start the year with staff or students getting sick from the heat. I am sorry to have to report this, and it is not a decision I am taking lightly, but the temperatures in many spaces in the high school today were at very high levels as of 3:00pm, and there were no areas in the building that were cool enough to provide relief for staff and students.
We have ordered 20 additional individual room air conditioners that will be delivered Wednesday, which will address the internal spaces that are the warmest, the temperatures are supposed to drop on Wednesday, and the chiller will have another 24 hours to catch up, so we fully anticipate that school will be held as scheduled on Wednesday. We also have a scheduled rotation to check the chiller every hour each night so we can prevent falling behind again.
I look forward to seeing our BK-8 students tomorrow, and our high school students on Wednesday. Thank you.
Dr. Bill Barnes
Superintendent of Schools
