Belleville grade school classroom declared mold-free

A school administrator said the mold that prompted a kindergarten class at Westhaven Elementary School in Belleville to have class in another room for a few days was smaller than his thumbnail. A mold expert tasked with testing the room compared it to a marker pen cap.

Belleville District 118 Superintendent Matt Klosterman said again on Wednesday that the students and teacher’s health and safety were paramount.

“We’re just trying to do what we believe is the right thing to do,” he said earlier in the week.

The kindergarteners will be back in their normal classroom perhaps as early as Friday, administrators say, following successful cleanup of mold. Depending on how long it takes to remove the remediation equipment and install drywall, it may be Monday.

“The air test passed,” Klosterman said. “The next step is to get our guys and a painter in.”

In order to pass, the air inside had to have a lower mold spore count than the air outside.

Jim Yasitis, managing principal of Collinsville’s Environmental Consultants, said the firm tested two areas inside of Westhaven to compare to a sample taken outside.

On Tuesday’s test, with results arriving on Wednesday, there was a single spore of the mold oidium on the air sample slide inside. The total spore count outside at the same time was 410.

Yasitis complimented the district’s work and that of St. Louis-based Advanced Environmental Services for the removal and remediation work.

“You usually can’t get it that low, because you bring mold into a building every time you open a door or window, and kids bring it in on their backpacks,” he said.

Mold counts are fickle, too.

“Every time you take a test ... the inside usually won’t change much, but outside changes by the minute on how the wind’s blowing, air temperature and humidity,” Yasitis said.

Environmental Consultants runs an air sampling test for 10 minutes, he said, longer than the three to five minutes recommended, to catch mold spores and other measurements of air quality.

“The industry standard is you look at the outside air and compare it to the inside of the building,” Yasitis said. “So if inside concentrations are lower, that’s good.”

Students had been out of the kindergarten classroom since before spring break; district officials had originally hoped they would return to their classroom on Tuesday.

District officials said no students or teachers were reported sick from mold contamination, and the “inactive” mold spores found in the classroom were inside the wall under drywall and paint.

Klosterman said the district’s assistant superintendent compared the absentee rates for kindergarteners across the district over the school year and found Westhaven’s rates consistent with the others.

“In any given building, a typical absentee rate would be about 2 to 4 percent,” Klosterman said.

Yasitis’ company tests schools and commercial buildings in Missouri and Southern Illinois, including many schools. He says his company runs mold tests at least once a week.

“There’s always mold everywhere,” he said.

This story was originally published March 30, 2016 at 2:19 PM with the headline "Belleville grade school classroom declared mold-free."