California’s largest school district is spending millions to protect kids from climate change (The 19th)
Photo courtesy of Brian Van Der Brug/Los Angeles Times/Getty Images.
Los Angeles parents demanded solutions as their children struggled in hot classrooms and on asphalt playgrounds. They say relief from extreme heat can’t come fast enough.
By Nadra Nittle, The 19th, July 21, 2023
The clouds that blanket Los Angeles in the late spring, keeping temperatures cool and skies overcast, dissipate by the first weeks of summer. The months known in the city near the ocean as “May Gray” and “June Gloom” give way to an exposed July sun that blazes relentlessly until well after the school year starts. It is not unusual for Angelenos to contend with triple-digit heat until shortly before Halloween.
When the mercury rises, many students can’t take refuge. They attend campuses with more cement than greenery, unreliable air-conditioning and drinking fountains that go unused due to water quality concerns.
“Oftentimes when we’re walking into class, it’s really hot,” said Romy Griego, who just completed her sophomore year at Eagle Rock High School in Northeast Los Angeles. “The sun is beating down on us, and the concrete gets really hot. Me and a couple of other students have talked about how much better our schools would be if we had more shade and trees and greenery just for us to cool down instead of the heat wearing us out.”
The stifling heat students are enduring to get an education led groups of parents, most of them moms, to hold protests on Los Angeles campuses during the 2022-23 school year.