With the growing rise in global temperatures, this has become even more important. Add to that the fact that class sizes are now in the thirties rather than the twenties, and classrooms are quickly becoming saunas on warmer days. Now a good deal of schools are now being air-conditioned, but even these are prone to problems, problems only compounded by a frustrating level of bureaucratic nonsense.
Since the beginning of this school year (actually since the second week of school during the school year prior), our building's air-conditioning has not worked well. We were told, around the time that the heat had to be turned on, that the problem was a couple of missing parts which our maintenance team did not have in their normal inventory. Because of certain regulations, in order to order the correct parts (let alone install them), the maintenance department needs to receive three different estimates on the parts, those estimates need to go before the school board, be voted on, and then can be ordered.
We have ten school days left in the school year. The board isn't going to vote on the bids until Monday. The parts will be ordered on Tuesday and are then supposed to take ten days for delivery. A problem that we knew about (and sent multiple notifications to maintenance and administration concerning) for at least an entire school year won't be fixed until after the school year is over (if it's even fixed then).
This is not a problem unique to our school system. Schools in general are being "paperworked" to death. This is, however, another reason (and not even my top reason) why year-round school is not a good idea.