Why is Classroom Air Quality so Important?
Allergens and particulates get carried into classrooms every day on students’ clothing, backpacks, hair, skin and shoes. For example, children who have pets at home inadvertently bring the dander into class, which becomes part of the classroom dust. On most days, there are more particulates in the air indoors than outdoors! When students breathe in all these particles, it triggers respiratory illnesses and issues with allergies and asthma. This can require treatment with expensive medications that make learning difficult. It can also cause students to miss school, which means they’re missing out on learning.
How Clean Classroom Air Helps Students and Families
Fewer Missed School Days
Cleaning the air in the classroom has been shown to reduce student absences due to respiratory infections. In fact, one school documented 61% fewer sick days!
Improved Test Scores
More time in class means more time to learn, so there’s a direct relationship between improving attendance and increasing test scores.
Less Sick Days for Parents
When a student stays home sick from school, a parent usually has to miss work to care for the child. This is not only an inconvenience, it can cost a lot of money for things like doctor visits, tests, prescriptions and over-the-counter medications. If the parent doesn’t have sick leave or they’ve used it all for repeated sick days, they won’t even get paid for the day. Keeping children healthy and in school means parents can stay at work and avoid costly medical expenses.
Reduced Use of Medications at School
Students with allergies and asthma often need to use expensive rescue inhalers and daily allergy medications at school. Some medicines can have side effects like drowsiness or excitability, which can make it difficult for kids to concentrate in class. By improving classroom air quality, some schools have documented a 70% reduction in rescue inhaler use!
Find Out How Purifan Can Improve the Air Quality in Your Child’s School
The statistics reported in this article are from schools who improved their indoor air quality by installing Purifan air filtration systems in classrooms. Find out how a Purifan can help clean the air in your child’s school.
It makes sense that making sure that the air in a school is clean would help cut down on the number of sick days due to respiratory issues that students have to take. I think that it would also be helpful to make sure that the rest of the school was clean as well because having a cleaner environment in general would probably help the air quality too. It would also probably be smart to have both the building and the air cleaned by professionals to help make sure that everything would be done safely and properly and that the students could feel their best.