This week ushers in the first day of summer, and with it, the first heat wave of 2024. A heat wave is defined as a temperature of 90 degrees or higher for at least three days, and from the looks of things, we’re in for one.
Like a lot of us, I’ve been reading through the articles, and spent time going through city and state websites urging New Yorkers to prepare for the extreme heat. State agencies are preparing to help those in need, because heat as intense as what we’ll face over the next few days can have serious health and safety implications. The CDC reports that 1,220 individuals are killed every year as a result of extreme heat, with the elderly and children being the most at risk.
Communities across New York are taking precautions — ensuring that people are aware of nearby resources where they can go to cool off — libraries and shopping malls, as well as government-run cooling centers. Knowing power grids will likely be taxed by an uptick in air-conditioning use in the next few days, utility companies are letting people know who to call if their power goes out, and city agencies are reminding people how to watch out for signs of heat exhaustion in themselves, others, and pets.
But as I have been looking through the extensive guidance, I’ve noticed a significant oversight — schools. There’s no information about what is being done for the children, faculty, and staff in school buildings across the state to prepare for what promises to be a truly scorching week.
The biological systems of children are still under development, which means kids are less able to regulate body temperature and release heat through sweating. Children are often not empowered to seek out cooler environments or get water to drink without express permission from adults in school, which can make it hard to adequately address the heat.
New York State has long imposed a minimum temperature in schools to keep buildings warm during cold East Coast winters, but has never had a statutory limit on maximum temperatures.
Until now.
There is a bill currently sitting on the Gov. Hochul’s desk, waiting to be signed, that would do just that.
This bill, S.3397A/A.9011A, establishes a maximum temperature in school buildings and indoor facilities, and requires schools take affirmative steps to cool classrooms once they reach 82 degrees; if a room reaches 88 degrees, the space is deemed too hot to continue occupying. This bill passed both the Senate and the Assembly earlier this month with bipartisan support.
Critics sometimes dismiss this legislation, remembering their own school days devoid of the comfort of air conditioning. They will characterize the idea of air conditioning in school as nothing but a nicety, and this bill as mandating a luxury. But as temperatures climb into the high 90s this week, and children sit in classrooms in which their attendance is legally required, we have to ask ourselves: what do we gain by burying our heads in the sand?
What do we accomplish by ignoring the pleas of educators sending legislators photographs of thermostats in their rooms in the 90s, begging for our help? We can not continue to turn a blind eye to young New Yorkers who spend their days within the walls of our schools. New York has a law for a maximum allowable temperature for animal shelters which begs the question: Why are we better protecting dogs and cats from extreme heat than our own children?
The science is unassailable — the planet is warming, and the summers are growing hotter every year. Many New York schools were not built with the soaring temperatures of 2024 in mind, and we must address this issue with the same collective concern with which we tackled lead paint and asbestos in previous decades. That it might require a paradigm shift for some doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be done.
It is our responsibility to protect our children, and it is not a luxury to be safe in a learning environment, and for that environment to be conducive to learning.
The research is clear — when classrooms are too hot, students can’t learn and teachers can’t teach. 2023 was the hottest year on record. This year is shaping up to be hotter still. I don’t want to look back in a decade and wish we had done something sooner.
The time to protect our children and educators from extreme heat is now. We shouldn’t wait until tragedy forces us to take action. With dangerously high temperatures in New York, this week would be the perfect opportunity for the governor to sign this critical legislation.
Skoufis is a state senator from Orange County.
