Meeting held at Whitesides Elementary School to discuss air quality

MOUNT PLEASANT, S.C. (WCBD) – Parents of students at Whitesides Elementary School say they’re still very concerned after some students had medical emergencies over the last few weeks at the school.

It comes after the elementary school found higher-than-normal levels of CO2 in the building, even prompting two days of e-learning last week.

“My biggest concern is for my daughter if she’s going to be alive when I pick her up or not,” said parent, Arkady Itskob.

“I think everybody has the safety of the students at the top of their minds,” another parent, Daniel Brownstein, said.

The Charleston County School District says a medical emergency with a student happened on September 29, and a second medical emergency happened last week on October 18.

This prompted the school to conduct air quality tests, due to higher-than-normal CO2 levels in the building.

The school district says the levels are within the guidelines set by the occupational safety and health administration.

Brownstein said, “They say they’ve gone through and checked all of the HVAC systems which they suspect was the issue. They’re also talking about installing CO2 monitors.”

Monday morning, the school held a meeting with parents and teachers.

Parents we spoke to said the meeting was packed, but not all of their questions were answered, one being how OSHA may apply CO2 standards differently to children.

“What number are you going to set here at Whitesides to determine what is safe or not safe for the kids, so at what levels are we going to start doing different things like going outside. When I walked out a few minutes ago they hadn’t figured out that number,” Parent, Jen Williams said.

Whitesides administrators sent an email to parents that said in part, “Moving forward, facilities management will ensure the periodic collection and analysis of data to verify the safety of the environment. Information will be shared regularly with parents via email. Our intent is to collect CO2 data weekly and mold data two times per month.”