Indoor Air Quality
The U.S EPA has developed an innovative program - Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) Tools for Schools - to help schools identify and address indoor air quality problems. This nationwide initiative is based on these premises:
Many IAQ problems can be prevented by the school community
IAQ problems can be resolved using the skills of the school staff
The expenditures and effort to prevent most IAQ problems are a fraction of that required to solve problems once they develop
EPA's Tools for Schools is based on an action kit providing all the materials necessary to promote a low-cost, problem-solving team approach to improving IAQ. Once a committee of administrators, teachers, maintenance staff, parents and others investigates and prioritizes indoor air hazards, short- and long-term strategies are developed to solve IAQ problems. The Department of Public Health, along with the Connecticut School Indoor Environmental Resource Team (CSIERT) - of which CEA is a member- provides training to Connecticut school districts to implement and sustain the Tools for Schools program.