Clean, Green, and Healthy Schools: Region 9 Highlights
Clean, Green and Healthy Schools Regional Highlights showcases exceptional school environmental health projects within each of EPA’s ten regions.
EPA Region 9 includes Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, and Nevada; and tribes; and the U.S. territories of American Samoa, Micronesia, Guam, Marshall Islands, N. Mariana Islands, and Palau Island.
On this page:
2014 Highlights
Working with Clean Air: El Marino to Address Air Pollution in Southern California
Representatives from the EPA, South Coast AQMD, CalTrans, EMLS, Culver City Unified School District, and Clean Air: El Marino, who have all been involved in improving environmental health and air quality at EMLS.Nearly 800 students from preschool through the fifth grade attend El Marino Language School (EMLS), a public elementary school located in Culver City, California. Interstate 405, the busiest freeway in the nation, passes through Culver City and in some places is within 50 feet of EMLS. Concerned about air quality and the health of the community, a group of parents came together in 2011 to research and implement mitigation strategies to ensure that every student, teacher, staff member, and parent volunteer at EMLS is breathing clean air. The group, Clean Air: El Marino, was founded by Dr. Rania Sabty-Daily and co-founded by Stephon Litwinczuk and Ariadna Martinez, all parents of children attending EMLS.
From the beginning, the founders envisioned a collaborative effort among all stakeholders, with open communication and transparent relationships. Through weekly school newsletters, social media, and direct communication, Clean Air: El Marino has worked to ensure that all members of the school community are updated on the group’s actions and feel encouraged to voice their opinions at any time.
Searching for effective solutions, Clean Air: El Marino contacted organizations for information on mitigating air pollution caused by traffic, including the South Coast Air Quality Management District (SCAQMD) and the Natural Resources Defense Council. They also reached out to academic institutions, including the University of Southern California (USC) and the University of California, Los Angeles, to gain insight on the ways that traffic pollution affects children. To strengthen their voice among stakeholders with decision-making authority, they engaged the school’s parent-teacher association, built relationships with administrators from the Culver City Unified School District (CCUSD), and connected with school board candidates as they campaigned.
To provide opportunities for community members to meet and hear from air quality experts, the group has organized public forums and workshops. Seeking support from EPA, the group invited Jorine Campopiano, EPA Region 9 Schools Coordinator, to attend a forum at EMLS. Region 9 has since become involved with Clean Air: El Marino by providing scientifically based advice and avenues for the group to share their efforts. In addition, Region 9 is currently developing a brochure (anticipated release in 2015) of best practices to reduce near-road pollution exposure at schools, which can assist schools in situations similar to EMLS.
To assess the impact of freeway traffic on air quality at the school, the group measured traffic-related air pollutants. Parent volunteers measured ultrafine particles (UFPs), a common byproduct of vehicle emissions, throughout the school site using air-monitoring devices from the Southern California Environmental Health Sciences Center at USC. Sampling results showed that UFP levels were highest in areas of the school closest to the freeway.
These results led CCUSD and So Cal Air Dynamics to collaborate on designing a pilot heating, ventilating, air conditioning, and air filtration (HVAC/filtration) system. Ferguson Enterprises, a nationwide wholesale distributor, donated the AC component of the pilot system, and IQ Air, a manufacturer of high-performance air filtration, donated the filtration component. In January 2014, Clean Air: El Marino, assisted by SCAQMD, measured UFP levels in a classroom after the pilot HVAC/filtration system was installed and found that over two days, 94% of the particles were removed. Having proven the effectiveness of the pilot system, efforts to install air filtration systems in all EMLS classrooms are now underway.
In only three years, Clean Air: El Marino has made significant contributions to improving environmental health at EMLS. They empowered their community to engage in important environmental and safety issues at school, and collaborated with the school district in finding solutions and taking action. Their work has inspired other community initiatives to promote children’s environmental health, such as tree-planting events, anti-idling campaigns, and chemical-free dusting campaigns for classrooms.
In future years, Clean Air: El Marino plans to build a toolkit that can serve as a model and resource for schools facing similar air quality challenges, and they will continue strengthening their relationship with the school district and the Culver City community.
2013 Highlights
Building Partnerships to Improve Southern California School Health
In 2012, California Safe Schools and California Communities Against Toxics, two local community groups, took state, federal and local agencies - including EPA management and staff on a “toxic bus tour” to highlight the multitude of Southern California schools built adjacent to polluting facilities or near contaminated sites. The communities communicated that there was a significant lack of coordination among local, state and federal agencies to address these hazards, so in order to create better communication among organizations, EPA’s Environmental Health Coordinator, Jorine Campopiano, developed a pilot program for a partnership to address schools and childcare centers in high priority areas. The goals of the program are to improve communication across agencies, to increase identification of facilities with increased risk to schools and improve outreach and informational exchange among schools and organizations.
The two major partners in the Southern California Green, Clean and Healthy Schools Partnership are EPA and California Department of Toxics and Substance Control; these two organizations will provide leadership and resources to the partnership. There are also many other state and local agencies which work with school environmental health that will participate on a stakeholder level, including: the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board, the South Coast Air Quality Management District, the California Air Resource Board, the California Department of Education, the California Department of Health, the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment and the California Department of Pesticide Regulation. The partnership will meet monthly to focus on 1-2 school-specific projects, as well as participate in an information exchange on topics of concern for schools.