Underventilated Astoria, LIC Schools Are More COVID Prone: Report

ASTORIA-LONG ISLAND CITY, QUEENS — Several New York City public schools in northwest Queens are underventilated, making them more prone to COVID-19 cases than buildings with stronger ventilation, according to an investigation.

The report, by WNYC/Gothamist, found that in 61NYC public schools, air is circulated through classrooms solely by open windows and two Intellipure purifiers; devices that lack the industry standard HEPA filters, but which the city purchased for a bargain. Other city offices, by contrast, use air purifiers that offer five times as much airflow per hour as the purifiers in the city's classrooms, WNYC/Gothamist found.

Three schools in Astoria and Long Island City are defined as "low-ventilation" buildings by this standard, including P.S. 084 Steinway, The Academy of American Studies, and The Riverview School. All told, eight Queens schools are underventilated according to the report.

Compared to schools with stronger ventilation in the same ZIP code, low-ventilation buildings saw 23 percent more COVID-19 cases among students this school year and a staff case rate that was 29 percent higher, WNYC/Gothamist found.

While independent experts reviewed and agreed with this analysis, a spokesperson for the Department of Education claimed that the findings were incorrect because "many students" go to school outside of the ZIP code where they live, and low-ventilation school building cases only account for 2 percent of verified cases at public schools this academic year.

WNYC/Gothamist, however, clapped back that less than a third of K-5 students go to school outside of their assigned zone — 70 percent of the low-ventilation schools were elementary schools — and that looking at total case counts, rather than rates-per-school, overlooks the risks at particular school buildings.

The site said that these findings are particularly concerning with winter around the corner, since depending on open windows at low-ventilation schools means classrooms will be very cold for months.

One Brooklyn teacher, whose child attends a low-ventilation school, told WNYC/Gothamist that administrators have reminded parents that windows will stay open per the school's ventilation policy.

“[They were] remote last year, so we haven’t experienced a winter with classroom windows open yet," the teacher said. “We have responded by buying more sweatshirts."

Read the full WNYC/Gothamist report here.