Forum On Safe Schools

Set For March 31

WOODBRIDGE — The Connecticut Foundation for Environmentally Safe Schools will present a forum on healthy, high performance schools on Wednesday, March 31. Among those attending will be Joellen Lawson of Newtown, foundation president.

Other collaborators in presenting the forum are the Connecticut Education Association, Toxics Action Center, the Ecological Health Organization, and the Amity Healthy Schools Campaign.

The featured speaker will be Claire Barnett, executive director of the Healthy Schools Network, a nonprofit advocacy, education, and research group located in Albany, N.Y. In her presentation Ms Barnett will discuss a recently released position statement that outlines priority steps that federal, state, and local officials are urged to take in order to make school facilities healthier and safer learning environments.

The Connnecticut Foundation for Environmentally Safe Schools (ConnFESS) was among the national coalition groups that helped to write the position statement. ConnFESS, formerly known the Canary Committee, was the lead grassroots organization that successfully lobbied for passage of the Act Concerning Indoor Air Quality in Schools, Public Act 03-220, in 2003.

“Our slogan, ‘All Schools Should Be Pollution Free,’ sums up our mission to promote policies, practices, and resources that protect school occupants from potentially harmful substances such as mold, pesticides, asbestos, radon, and lead,” said Ms Lawson, who founded the Canary Committee.

Connecticut’s Indoor Air Quality legislation enacted last July incorporates many, but not all, of the guidelines in the National Healthy Schools Coalition Position Statement (www.healthyschools.org), she said.

“Together the manades in Public Act 03-220 and this position statement provide a potent remedy for curing the sick school epidemic,” she said.

The forum will take place at 7 pm in the Jewish Community Center of Greater New Haven in Woodbridge. Admission is free. Call 203-436-2954 to reserve a seat.