East St. Louis middle school delays start of school year due to mold issues
Students attending Lincoln Middle School will have to wait until at least next week to start classes in-person due to mold in the school, according to East St. Louis School District 189. The first day of classes was supposed to be Monday, Aug 15.
Sydney Stigge-Kaufman, director of communications for the district, said mold was first discovered on Aug. 8 as staff and cleaning crews prepared for the first day of school. The middle school, located at 12 S. 10th St., was immediately closed as a precaution.
According to an Aug. 11 news release on the district’s website, the mold developed in areas of the school due to an HVAC failure. Environmental Consultants LLC, whose corporate headquarters is in Collinsville, verified the detection of mold, and Alliance Restoration Services began removing mold and cleaning the school. Another contractor has fixed the HVAC system, and all affected items were removed.
Environmental Consultants is running tests to determine air quality levels, which prompted the school to begin an e-learning day, instead of in-person classes, on Aug 15. However, due to cleaning efforts still being underway and not many families picking up Chromebooks for students, the district announced on Aug. 13 that classes will be delayed until Aug. 22. The district is hoping to have in-person classes on that day. No e-learning instruction will be held this week.
“We were remediating as soon as Tuesday, but the work had not been completed,” Stigge-Kaufman said. “We were hoping that we would not even have to do an e-learning day on Monday, the 15th.”
Stigge-Kaufman didn’t immediately know the exact locations of where mold was found in the school, but she said the presence of mold is a new issue for Lincoln Middle School, which has over 400 students enrolled. No one was harmed due to exposure from the mold. She said the district is working on plans for how the delay will affect the school’s calendar.
“Remediation efforts are being addressed, and, again, we’re hopeful that everyone can be in-person on Monday and that we are asking for families to pick up a Chromebook just so that we have that as a backup.”
Families of students attending Lincoln Middle School can pick up Chromebooks at the district’s administration building, located at 1005 State St., today until Aug. 19 from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Students must be present when picking up Chromebooks.
