Last Friday I listened to an interview conducted by Sébastien Bovet, with the Minister of Education, Bernard Drainville.
Regarding the new schools to be built, Sébastien Bovet asked him if air conditioning would be present in these future establishments.
Bernard Drainville’s response: “There will be a mechanical ventilation system, which will allow for a temperature between 21 and 26 degrees,” to which Sébastien Bovet responded by asking if a temperature of 26 degrees was really cool. Bernard Drainville’s response: “Yes, when it’s 32 outside, you can feel the difference.”
This contemptuous response towards children, who the government says are the State’s priority, leads me to question the usefulness and relevance that the Lab-École establishments have had and will have in practice, a very recent pilot project, whose qualities and merits have been praised.
One of his mandates was, and I quote: “the school must be the scene of his daily well-being” (speaking of the student).
What were the subjects of study if comfort and working conditions, both for teachers and students, were not on the agenda for improvements?
Climate change predicts irreversible warming in the coming years… but we are already tolerating 26 degrees in classrooms!
Where were the visionaries in this project? Were they able to make their voices heard? No one to point out that the temperature of a room where children and teachers will be confined for an entire day must be kept below 23.5 degrees, as recommended by the National Institute of Public Health of Quebec?
So these two bodies (INSPQ and Education) do not talk to each other? One violates what the other recommends? With impunity?
I sincerely hope that this “false standard” of 26 degrees will be revised downwards before the construction of new schools.