Five Wootton High School students spoke Thursday at the Montgomery County Board of Education concerning the “unhygienic environment” and “crumbling infrastructure” at their school in Rockville.
Ashi Stanislaus, secretary of the student government association, told board members, “students face problems with the bathrooms every single day. There are many issues including mold, broken toilets, broken faucets, and bathrooms without mirrors.”
Many of those issues were pointed out to school officials last school year, she said.
Montgomery County Public Schools Assistant Superintendent Seth Adams explained that work on the bathrooms should begin during this school year. “I think that work can certainly start this year,” he said.
Officials reviewed the bathroom situation during the summer, and architects currently are designing a fix now, Adams said.
Because Wootton is expected either to be torn down and rebuilt or renovated within a few years, officials at first were reluctant to pump money into the bathrooms. However, that view has changed and plans now include work on the bathrooms now, Adams explained.
“It just makes sense,” he said.
Rhea Chelar, a senior and copresident of the student government association, also testified Tuesday about water damage and mold in the ceilings.
Maddy Mathew, a junior, spoke of a “faulty air conditioning system,” noting, “I never know what I’m going to expect when I start each day at Wootton.” In some classes, she is freezing while in others, she sweats, Mathew said.
“The extreme differences in temperature throughout the building cause many students to have a hard time focusing in class. In fact, every year students have to layer, not for the outdoors, but for their own classrooms,” she said.
Natalie Jack, a junior, attended a drama camp in Wootton when she was 10 years old. The same issues of a “revolting odor from the toilets” and bathroom doors that don’t shut still exist, she said.
All her friends agree that their school has “putrid toilets, unusable sinks, large stall gaps and decaying floors,” said Jack, who waits to go to go to the bathroom until she returns home at the end of the school day.
Madeline Eig, a junior, said the school was not ADA compliant. She pointed to cracks in the sidewalks and uneven surfaces where a person could trip.
During a recent fire drill, she noticed a few students having trouble rushing out of the building. The school needs safer exits with ramps, she said.
