This Season Give the Gift of Heat

Imagine this:

One day in mid December you show up to work. Sometime in the morning the heater bites the dust- literally. In a click and a pop, water begins to gush out of the heating unit in torrents.

A call to maintenance and a HVAC visit later, and you are told that they need to order a “special” part, which should arrive in another six to eight weeks.

You are told by your boss that this should be a mild winter, not to worry- just keep your door open and have your room heated by the hallway and adjacent rooms.

Yeah, nice short-term solution. What would you do as a professional? Now imagine that you a teacher with a room full of middle school students.

Truth is stranger than fiction.

I returned from winter break to find my heating unit gutted, leaving various pipes and wires exposed to the classroom. Yeah- if you don’t have a tremendous sense of humor, you won’t last very long in this business.

Well, the past few weeks were uncharacteristically warm, with afternoon highs reaching a record-breaking 60 degrees Fahrenheit outside. At best the situation was bearable. In the past few weeks the thermometer read 62 degrees by morning, 65 with kids in the room, reaching a pinnacle of 67 degrees by late afternoon.

Temperatures have dropped in the past two days. Yesterday it flurried. To make matters worse, I am the last classroom in the wing, and have large windows to boot. Concrete floors and cinderblock walls have grabbed onto the coldness rather than provide insulation. It was cold before; now it's getting damn cold.

The kids are asking if they can grab their winter jackets from their lockers. They are asking why we don’t have heat. I josh that, "You can have heat without a heater," as I point to the empty radiator casing and let out a nervous laugh.

This joke isn’t funny any more.

I am no longer good humored by the situation. Wouldn’t it be humane to have a heated classroom? Geesh! It feels like I am teaching in a third-world schoolhouse. No, wait- apparently children in Africa have a nicer classroom facility. Go figure.

I’ve already put in several work orders to have the heater fixed. The reply? “Duplicate work order- part on order”. It doesn’t get better than this. I broke down and wrote a tell-tale email to the administrators (who are already aware of the situation). Amazingly enough the HVAC crew is back in my classroom the next day.

Would it shock you to mention that they are soldering wires and pipes with a blowtorch as I am reading with my students? It shouldn’t.

Would it shock you that there still isn’t heat in my classroom one month after my heater met with an early demise? It shouldn’t.

Would it shock you to learn that the entire building suffers a mortal wound to our heating system? Just this morning I witnessed the secretaries wheel in a portable heater into the front office. It shouldn’t

So why I am writing about all this? Shouldn’t I get off my ass and do something about the situation? “Light a candle or curse the darkness” and all that. Right?

I’ve already filled out the proper paperwork (on multiple occasions).

I’ve already let the powers-that-be know about the condition.

I have vocalized the situation to students and my colleagues alike.

I'd like to buy my own portable heater for the classroom, but that falls under the category "Good Samaritan things to due and get sued for". Teachers can no longer bring fans into their classroom in those hot summer months; it poses a safety hazzard to children's fingers. Can you imagine the liability on a heater? You think chopped fingers are bad? Imaging the bzzzzzt as a stupid child wrangles their fingers into the heating mechanism for a lesson in conductivity of electricity. Yup- imsurance companies and the threat of lawsuits have invaded common sense solutions to real world problems.

I’ve had it. This situation is out of control and inhumane. I’m blogging to vent. Touche'!

Believe it.

Tags: school, education, heat, winter, HVAC