Newton South students spent about 10 minutes out in the cold today, but the problems could be a bit more severe. From the Principal on the Newton South PTSO blog:
What started in the morning as a major water leak due to a frozen, split coil in a heating unit became in the afternoon a short in an electrical box in the basement boiler room due to the water, prompting the fire alarm system to sound and forcing an evacuation into the cold weather around 1 pm. Students were outside for 10-15 minutes while the fire department assessed the situation and determined that it was safe for students to reenter all other parts of the building except for the part with the boiler room (the 9000 building).
I’m hearing that there could be major problems in the shop, including lost materials. Given that the LigerBots have our big kickoff this weekend and are scheduled to start our 6-week build season, losing the shop could be a big deal.
What is the Newton South blog, and how does one subscribe to it? I’m a Newton South parent, got a text from my Junior, saying, “rehearsal canceled” building is shut down, everyone being sent home. Unfortunately, this was after the buses had left, so hundreds of students were stuck in the field house, and then sent outside in the cold to get Ubers, or make calls for rides. I don’t understand how this doesn’t merit a robocall. We got one this morning from the Superintendent about bus delays, with the message that we would be updated “as soon as possible” No further updates were provided. Newton South families needed to hear this information much faster than seeing it on Village 14 at 4:30 pm. If this was really known “early this morning” why wasn’t the school evacuated earlier, or at least before the buses departed? Buses on Tuesdays leave around 2:00 pm. The students who stay for sports, theater, and other activities were told to go to the field house, and then evacuated at 2:30 pm. Also, I’m not a newbie parent. Have had kids at Newton South since 2004. We haven’t gotten an email or a robo call about this event today.
Just went to Newton South High School website. There is nothing about this on the home page. Then I clicked on the PTSO page. Here is the full text: (this type of message usually gets sent to everyone’s email – if you weren’t looking for the message, there is no way you would know about it)
Greetings – may your 2018 be healthy and joyful!
What started in the morning as a major water leak due to a frozen, split coil in a heating unit became in the afternoon a short in an electrical box in the basement boiler room due to the water leak, prompting the fire alarm system to sound and forcing an evacuation into the cold weather around 1 pm. Students were outside for 10-15 minutes while the fire department assessed the situation and determined that it was safe for students to reenter all other parts of the building except for the part with the boiler room (the 9000 building). Eventually, this was cleared too, and students and teachers in 9000s were also allowed to return to their classroom prior to the end of the school day. Students and staff responded promptly (if reluctantly) and the evacuation was very smooth. In the end, it was painful, but hopefully there are no lasting effects from being outside in the cold. In case you were wondering, had the fire department not been able to allow us to re-enter we would have moved all students to the middle schools and dismissed from there.
Later, during our after school activities, we were asked again to evacuate the building by the fire department so that the facilities folks could assess and repair the damage from the water leak – we were thankful that students and staff were allowed to stay in the field house rather than outside in the cold. We also had a pipe burst in the second floor of the 3000s after school, and our custodial crew is at work cleaning that up too. It’s been an eventful day!
In the unlikely event that we do not have school tomorrow, we will contact you by phone and email by 5:30 AM.
On a positive note: earlier in the day, the senior class officers shared the completed NSHS Lip Dub with the class of 2018 during advisory. In my opinion, it looks amazing! Terrific work by the production crew (all NSHS students) and Lip Dub team! Next Tuesday, we will share the video with the class of 2019 during advisory, after which time we will make the video available for all to see. I’m looking forward to sharing it with you.
Update: 6:03 pm – above message arrived from Joel in email. Good to know, but I think it should have been sent out much earlier, when the decision was made to evacuate.
We have a new School Committee that took office yesterday. Hopefully, they will do a better job communicating.
I’m sure the school system/city building department has been focused on repairing the heating system so it’s in working condition tomorrow.
The school committee deals with facilities issues at a different level. Do 21 schools have heating/cooling systems that are dependable? What are the protocols for accommodating students and communicating to parents when the school heating system dies?
My son called to tell me about the evacuation. Why did Inhave to wait over three hours for an official email from the principal? Without real information in real time we are left without knowing what is going on. I didn’t need to know all the details at 2:30 but would have preferred a 2:30 email followed by a 6:30 email with a full update.
Text from my daughter at 12:49 pm today – evacuated again – no details.
Anybody know what’s going on?
My son says that they were evacuated because a pipe burst and caused low pressure which caused the alarm to go off. Would be nice to get that information from an adult and not my kid.
Do parents get notified for every fire alarm that goes off in a school?
NewtonMom, I’m sure we will get a cheery note at 6:05 pm tonight.
Communication is an ongoing systemic challenge in the Newton Public Schools. The Superintendent can release a robocall to every household about school closings, but individual schools do not have something similar. They rely heavily on the PTSOs to send communication. The PTSO usually only sends out one communication on Sunday evenings. The email we got last night at 6:03 pm was from the PTSO and you saw that it wasn’t specifically about the boiler room and the burst pipes, it also included light banter about the senior lip dub. Hopefully, they will be looking into a better format. I know that the skyward application was scratched after one year, and there was $100,000 in the budget this year to roll out a new school information system. I know that it is related to attendance, grades, etcetera. I haven’t heard about a system to notify families of emergencies or important information in “real time” by individual school. I’m glad that today was a balmy 30 degrees as opposed to yesterday’s single digits.
Parents don’t have to be notified about every fire alarm, especially when so many of them are drills. However, when there is a real emergency, families should be notified. Burst pipes and boiler room explosion and flood and two days in a row are a bit more concerning. Also, parents are being texted to by smart teens who have smartphones. The school would do better by parents to put out a quick communication with clarity, even if brief. Even the smart teens don’t know the full details, and false rumors can run wild until a communication from the school arrives. It is extreme weather, and folks are having problems at home with burst pipes and broken furnaces, so I’m not surprised that it’s happening at school. However, the Principal, or the Superintendent, or the Facilities team should update parents. Maybe the systems are old, and need upgrading. Budget season is upon us. Some years ago, there were furnaces across multiple schools that were aging, and very precarious, and each one was approached by bandaid when there was a problem. There has been huge improvements in the inventory and funding of upgrades. Nobody wants to wait for a furnace to explode and have a real fire in the school while our kids are there. Just a year or two ago, there was a serious problem at one of the elementary schools. Luckily, the custodians were there early before the kids arrived, and detected it and got the message out to cancel school. (That’s my plug for not outsourcing our custodians)
Email was just sent!
Expect more of this next week!
@TheWholeTruth – I would certainly expect a text alert or robocall when kids were being sent home early.
@Meredith – No they weren’t sent home early. They evacuated the building during the school day and after 15 minutes (my daughter’s guess) headed back inside.
@Jerry – read the first comment. Kids who were supposed to be at after-school activities yesterday got sent home early (i.e., before their parents were expecting them or had planned to pick them up).
Yes, my comment was for the evacuation on Tuesday, not today. My daughter was very upset, because she doesn’t get cell service at South, and was not allowed back in the building to use a landline. She was at rehearsal, then all students were sent to the field house, then evacuated AFTER the buses had left. So kids had to get ubers or find ways to contact parents for rides. I was supposed to pick her up at 5:30 pm at rehearsal. I had no idea that she was stranded at 2:30 pm. She was lucky to get a ride from a friend’s mom, and as soon as they were a few streets away from South, she was able to let me know not to pick her up at 5:30 pm. She has been taking the bus since she was 5 years old, and wouldn’t have had a problem taking the bus, but the decision to evacuate wasn’t made until after the buses departed. Also, Tuesday was the day that it was in the single digits, so they had to stand outside in very bitter weather while waiting on ubers and parents.
In response to Jo-Louise: Actually each principal has the ability to send emails and/or phone calls (robocalls) to all of the parents and/or students at their school using the exact same system that Dr. Fleishman uses to cancel school (It is called School Messenger and it is attached to Skyward.)