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economist suntribune education saturday nov 13 1999 11 students protest portables unionville high school students walk out over health concerns by jennifer brown staff writer renovated or not students at unionville high school say theyre fed up with portables they feel will continue to be a health risk for themselves and their teachers on friday morning about 100 stu dents walked out of class protesting the air quality of the portables even though the school board has just completed more than 300000 worth of renova tions on the 12pack school structure last august the school board shut down the portable classrooms at the high school after mould was found just two weeks before school was set to begin recently both the health department and municipal officials approved the renovation work and the classrooms are safe said superintendent of plant ser vices dave snelgrove in this case we gutted it right back to the shell and it has a new roof walls ceil ing and floor and electrical system he said in our mind its as good as new but parent ailsa siks said its hard to believe a portable can be inhabitable again after mould was found in its walls how do we know the mould wont be back in three months said siks a former member of the schools council her children arent currently attend ing class in a portable but know of oth ers who have complained the air quality in portables has affected their health the main concern here is trust how safe is it now when you said it was safe before she said a lot of us feel the school needs expanding this should not have been a portapak for 14 years this is the second very expensive retrofit of these portables and me third of the air system there are more than 2000 students at the school which was originally built to handle 1250 but the board has told par ents that given population projections the community does not need another high school or even an addition about 360 attend class in the portapak since the portables were reopened teachers and students say the air in the buildings has had an odour to it and rodent feces and a rats riest has been found inside the structure no matter how many times you rebuild something its still a portable said student council representative grant holohan an oac student who participated in the walkout friday whatif its hot safe again a few years from now i dont feel safe going into portables anymore snelgrove defends the renovation sheridan j heating air conditioning call 4714222 furnaces from 2995 sayingthe air circulation has been great ly improved compared to before there are air exchange units bring ing outside air in and the stale air is exhausted outside what may be mak ing it more stuffy is the new materials used in the renovation such as adhe- sives and vinyl which may be making it stuffy he said however for some students and teachers the opening of the newly reno vated portables only means they will be forced to continue teaching and learn ing in portables leaving them won dering if mould could develop again unionville high opened in 1985 and the next year the portables were deliv ered to the school site since they were put in place the heating system has been replaced twice and the structure reconditioned three times but the school may be stuck with the 12pack for a while the life expectancy for a wood constructed portable is 15 to 20 years and longer if they are never moved however the unionville portables are steel frame and snelgrove said they can last 20 to 30 years if properly main tained and it is estimated the population of unionville high will eventually level off to 1600 students thereby reducing the use of some of the portables i can understand the boards reluc tance to put another school in the catchment area they dont want to end up like toronto with a lot of empty schools down the road siks said theyre caught between a rock and a hard place and theres only so much money to go around siks pointed out the school board is caught in the same growth spurt 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