By Francis Koster

Most of our local K-12 schools will be starting up in the next few weeks.

And in North Carolina, aging school buildings are putting our kids’ health and ability to learn at risk. There are actions we can take to fix this.

Pop quiz:

• Question No. 1: How many North Carolina citizens work in or attend classes in our state’s K-12 School buildings?

Answer: Almost 2 million — around one in 5 of all North Carolina citizens.

• Question No. 2: How many school buildings do these citizens study and work in?

Answer: Around 2,700 buildings.

• Question No. 3: In this time of rising temperatures, what percentage of those 2,700 buildings have obsolete air conditioning that can lower a students ability to learn, can cause asthma (the leading cause of student absenteeism), and contributes to teacher resignation?

Answer: About half. These older buildings were built in the 1950s and early 1960s, and were not designed to have the air conditioning bring in fresh air.

Teachers used to be able to open the classroom doors and windows to get fresh air into the classroom, but now “to protect the students” the windows are screwed shut. Indoor air pollution increases all day long as the kid’s breathe in oxygen and breathe out carbon dioxide — over and over.

As scientists from Duke University, Lawrence Berkley Laboratory, Harvard and The Environmental Protection Agency have proven, this lowers a child’s mental functioning.

• Question No. 4: Why is this a big deal now?

Answer: To bring this home to you, we can use Raleigh as an example. The city had a temperature of 106 degrees on July 5 this year (the highest temperature ever recorded there). If summer school was in session, how do you think that felt inside the schools?

Unless something is done to upgrade our school buildings, as our state grows warmer, the more the people inside the buildings will feel hotter and stuffier, learning will continue to decline, more teachers will quit, and the rate of teacher and student illness will increase.

• Question No. 5: What can we do to fix this mess?

Answer: Due to an obsolete state law, North Carolina public school buildings and upgrades are mostly required to be paid for by local property taxes.

We are one of a small number of states that do not fund school buildings equally across the state. Towns with low-income workers, and low property tax base simply cannot afford to fix their schools, while wealthy communities can. And the kids of the rich learn more and stay healthier, and the health and learning of kids of the poor suffers.

Talk to your local school officials and ask them to be frank with you about the challenges they are facing as rising temperatures and humidity make learning in their old school buildings more difficult. Then both of you contact your local elected officials and figure out next steps.

Working together, we can get the state legislature to fix this mess.

Dr. Francis Koster is a retired pediatric healthcare administrator who now runs a not-for-profit that lends meters and gauges to folks who want to make sure their kid’s schools are safe and optimal for learning. You can see his website at www.thepollutiondetectives.org.