Last year over 50 schools in London were identified as suffering from harmful levels of air pollution in a School Air Quality Audit Report by the Mayor of London’s office.
As a result of the audit, several recommendations for the schools were set out which included installing air purifiers, green planting and walking to school.
Christopher Hatton Primary School, Gospel Oak Primary & Nursery School and Netley Primary School and Centre for Autism, located in the borough of Camden, installed air purifiers from Swedish company Blueair.
A year later, teachers from all three schools say that the air purifiers are beneficial to the children’s learning, focus and results. More than half of the 56 teachers surveyed also say that they have noticed a decrease in sick absenteeism among themselves and the children.
Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, comments in his foreword to the School Air Quality Audit Report: “We are confident that implementing the recommendations from these audits will go a long way to delivering cleaner air, reducing health inequalities and, most importantly, improving the health and wellbeing of our children.”
A survey of teachers and staff at Christopher Hatton, Gospel Oak and Netley primary schools, one year after the installation of Blueair air purifiers, show that improving classroom air quality can have a major effect on the health and learning of children.
