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"Mold was found in King's Highway Elementary School in a kindergarten classroom and as a result, one class of kindergarten children have spent a little over the first week of school having their classes in the library. The principal assured parents in an email that the teacher had been provided "with all the materials necessary to ensure your child has a wonderful start to the school year." (Westport Minuteman)
Mold was found in King's Highway Elementary School in a kindergarten classroom and as a result, one class of kindergarten children have spent a little over the first week of school having their classes in the library. The principal assured parents in an email that the teacher had been provided "with all the materials necessary to ensure your child has a wonderful start to the school year."
http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=20116751&BRD=1654&PAG=461&dept_id=12915&rfi=6
Mold was also found in Coleytown Elementary and Coleytown Middle Schools in non-classroom areas, and Jo Ann Duncan, who spoke to the Westport Board of Education Monday night, said that she was told that those areas were "under control."
Duncan, the coordinator of an air quality program called Tools for Schools, said after the meeting that she had not seen the areas in question at either of the two Coleytown schools, although she had seen King's Highway.
At Kings Highway, an alert teacher spotted the mold on a glued-down area rug in her classroom when she returned around the Aug. 14, according to an email sent to parents by principal Maria Casteluccio, and made available to the Minuteman by others.
Castellucio said the mold was tested and found to be Aspergillus.
School personnel then removed the rug promptly, cleaned the room, and the room was then re-tested for mold by Hygenix, an environmental consulting firm.
Higher than usual mold counts were found in both the kindergarten room and the speech room across the hall, which had not previously had a problem. Rooms on either side of the kindergarten room were also tested and found to have normal counts, according to Duncan. However, she said that the level of mold in the kindergarten room "was only slightly elevated."
The kindergarten and speech rooms were then professionally cleaned by a company that specializes in mold remediation.
"They did the right thing and they cleaned the room again. They went that extra step because they wanted to be thorough," Duncan said.
The rooms were re-tested by Hygenix and this time mold levels were normal.
Children were allowed back into the rooms a bit more than a week after school started.
©Westport Minuteman 2008
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