Tenafly High School, with part of its HVAC system dating back to 1972, has long faced heating and cooling issues, according to Mr. Morrison, the school principal. Problems have persisted across all seasons, leaving classrooms with wildly varying temperatures that often mirror the extreme weather outside. For years, students and staff have endured these inconsistent conditions, but their concerns have now reached a tipping point, prompting renewed calls for action.
The school has been dealing with heating and cooling problems for decades. Students and staff have, for many years, reported that their classes are either too hot or too cold, and that the AC is out of control or not working.
“When the AC isn’t working properly, it’s very uncomfortable for the teacher. It can be very hard to teach, but the larger issue is the negative impact on student learning,” said Ms. Lori Hampson, a teacher in the English Department, who has spoken up multiple times during her class about the issue, due to the poor ventilation, particularly in her classroom. Additionally, Hampson says the whole Social Studies hallway experiences similar problems, due to its rooms facing the heat of the western sun.
According to Watermark, “[Student’s] learning environment or classroom structure determines whether the educational setting meets their needs.” The AC issues not only affect the comfortability of THS students and staff, but they also affect students’ academic lives.
“If it’s too hot, some kids might get dizzy, they may fall asleep. If it’s too cold, that can also be very difficult,” Hampson said.
Over the decades there have been multiple complaints about the school heating, yet the school has taken little action to remedy the problems until recently. “I’ve experienced the issues since I started in 1997,” Mr. Whitehead, an English teacher, said. Nearly a quarter century later, an article raising concerns about the school heating and cooling problems was published in The Echo, detailing the difficult conditions. “There was no longer a high school. Only a building-sized oven stood in its place,” Liam Tenenbaum (’25), current Co-Editor-in-Chief of The Echo, satirized in 2021 when the AC was not working during a heatwave.
Five years prior, in 2016, parents expressed their worry that future heat waves may affect students’ learning. According to The Northern Valley Press, a local newspaper, a study was conducted by French and Parrello Associates, who stated that the cost to install a central air conditioning in the district would be about $17 million, a cost that must have been prohibitive given that the units in the old wing of the high school were not updated.
The latest complaints about the HVAC system were voiced a mere five months ago in September, as Morrison acknowledged. At that time, the air conditioning was not turned on and many staff and students noticed the change in temperature to hot and humid.
Morrison stated the systems had simply been turned off: “We fought to keep the air conditioning on as late as we could, and my argument was that we’re going to need air conditioning for finals, but I was taking a chance because [the AC repair company people] were saying if you don’t let us shut it down in May, it might not be ready for September.” However, it later turned out that the air conditioning was not repaired, even by the start of school eleven weeks later, which explains the irregularly hot last and first few weeks of September. While this ongoing issue has impacted the well-being of the THS community, a clear solution has been proposed through the referendum: to update the HVAC units in the old wing of the school.
Morrison explained that the whole air condition system needs to be replaced, which is “labor intensive,” and therefore the 11 weeks during the summer vacation weren’t enough time.
While this ongoing issue has impacted the well-being of the THS community, a solution has been proposed, thanks to the recently passed referendum: to update the HVAC units in parts of the school.
“We are replacing our heating and air conditioning units for the old wing,” Morrison said, “but the new wing, where your science classes are, has a different system to the rest of the school, so the AC won’t be renewed there.”
Mold has also apparently been a problem related to the HVAC system at the high school. According to Morrison, the air conditioning unit causes immense moisture in the pipes that rest in the ceilings of the school in the old wing. “If there is moisture in those pipes, you’re going to get stains on the back of those tiles,” he said, adding that “Every time we see a stain, we take action.”
Mold has not only formed in the ceiling tiles but has been observed in the art classrooms. Various art rooms use paint boxes to keep paint from drying for long periods of time. The device works if a thin layer of a wet sponge, coupled with a wet piece of paper, lies in the paint box to keep moisture in the paint. Mold has been forming in the boxes overnight, ruining the art supplies and causing a waste of paint and other tools.
These incidents have prompted theories and rumors that have also wafted through the hallways. When mold is released into the air, it can possibly cause problems such as pulmonary fibrosis, a scarring in the lungs, depending on the type of mold. Although not proven that there is mold in the air at the high school, some are concerned about possible health effects, especially for people who already have pre-existing lung conditions.
“The school knows about it. I think they haven’t done anything about it because it’s a really expensive issue to fix, and I understand that,” Annabelle Denniston (’25) said. “However, it is not okay how they are filtering out people who are speaking up about the situation. Staff and students are afraid to speak up, which isn’t good, as there is a health issue being posed to the school community.”
Students have also expressed frustration and skepticism about expenditures the school has made on projects that seem less important than the HVAC issues. For example, in 2023, the school spent $53,139.44 on a project to replace the carpet in the high school media center, according to the Tenafly Public Meeting Minutes. Many are concerned that money has been spent on the wrong things at the school.
“Why is it that we have …mold … in our ceilings that can have an actual side-effect on the students, and instead we spend over $10,000 replacing the library carpeting when the carpet was fine beforehand?” Denniston said. “Why [does] the school spend thousands of dollars on costumes [for] plays like The Little Mermaid when I was in the show, but they aren’t spending money to fix the mold in the ceilings? First, you have to address the issues that actually pose a risk to our health, and then you can start working on aesthetics and school programs.”
Ultimately, the ongoing heating, cooling, and mold issues at Tenafly High School have raised awareness about the impact they have on the health, comfort, and academic experience of everyone in the building. While the administration has taken small steps to address some of the mold in the ceiling by removing individual tiles, challenges remain. Members of the school community have expressed differing opinions on how resources should be allocated, balancing the need for safety improvements with other priorities.
Fortunately, this coming spring, students can expect to have working air condition units throughout their classrooms. “The system is up and working,” Morrison said.
