Aug 18, 2008 5:01 pm US/Central
Schools Heat Up As Air Conditioning Units Removed
Industrial Units Were Leased; CPS Doesn't Have Funding To Keep Them Through Hot Months
CHICAGO (CBS) ―
A dozen Chicago public schools spending their first summer on the year-round calendar have suddenly lost their air conditioners.
Classes at the schools started on August 4. At that time every classroom at Earle Elementary and 11 other schools had an air conditioning unit. As of Monday morning, none of the classroom has air conditioning. There are big fans inside the classrooms because there are now big holes where the 19 industrial air conditioning units used to be mounted.
"I think they should have left them in there," student Ashley Lee told CBS 2's Dorothy Tucker. "You're hot and you're trying to do your work and you can't concentrate 'cause you're so hot."
Earle started off the summer nice and cool. The units had been installed in mid-June when summer school started. So they were in place when year round classes began earlier this month. Many parents assumed the building would be cool all summer.
"I think we should get together and protest," said parent Sarah Williams.
Earle isn't the only school suddenly suffering in the heat. It's on a list with 11 other schools, with a total of 400 air conditioning units were removed from all the schools.
Those schools are: Banneker, Brownell, Dixon, Fiske, Hinton, Reavis, Revere, Yale, Woods, Whistler and Wentworth.
The issue, according to CPS Chief Officer of School Coordination Jackie Anderson, is funding. The units were leased and it cost the district more than $1 million.
"For that lease to be extended it would cost us about a quarter of million and we don't have the funding," Anderson said.
Water was delivered to every classroom Monday afternoon and administrators made sure every room had a fan.
School administrators say because it cost so much to lease the units, next summer they plan to buy cheaper systems and make them permanent fixtures in the schools.
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