OCCUPATIONAL HYGIENE

Occupational Hygiene

Occupational Hygiene

Introduction

Education, in the United Kingdom, is accomplished through a highly fragmented system of school districts nested within sovereign states governed by locally elected school boards. The laws governing the built environment in the UK public schools are fragmented horizontally and vertically. This fragmentation has resulted in a national system of public schools where there are no consensus standards regulating its built environment. This loosely regulated environment exposes its occupants to known health hazards with the resultant marginal social costs absorbed by society. The paper focuses on building a noise control plan and reducing noise from a school refurbishing site.

Discussion

From the point of view of an occupational hygienist, the following actions can be undertaken to reduce the noise level on a school construction site:

School Environment

For reducing noise on a school construction site, the maintenance of a school environment is one of the most important considerations to be undertaken. The school environment is defined as including everything that a student is exposed to during a normal school day. While adults work in heavily regulated occupational environments and elderly are cared for in a highly regulated healthcare environment, these elementary and secondary students are exposed each day to an environment that is regulated in an incomplete, piecemeal fashion. The surrounding of the school includes everything from the sun, sky, and clouds to windows, buildings and cars. The educational environment included those elements of the environment that were malleable and included "physical features, with the materials employed in it, with the use of time, and above all, with the innumerable contacts between the classroom's occupants (Heikkii, 2009, pp 78).

Built Environment

Another important feature of the plan should be the built environment. The built environment is that part of our surroundings, external to our persons, which are made or modified by man. The built environment can be described in three scales: small, intermediate and large (or alternatively; micro, exo and macro systems). Small scale built environment includes objects like computer keyboards and relates to health issues like ergonomics and biomechanics. Intermediate scale built environment includes building-sized spaces and relate to health issues like air quality and indoor lighting. Large scale built environment involves neighbourhoods and metropolitan areas and relate to health issues like outdoor air pollution, physical activity (Rich, 2009, pp 96).

Indoor air quality, ventilation and thermal comfort

The indoor air quality (IAQ) in our nation's public schools creates substantial societal costs due to acute health symptoms, absences and reduced academic performance. There is a significant association between classroom ventilation rates and performance on mathematic exams using concentrations as a proxy for ventilation rates). Portable classrooms (commonly utilized by some overcrowded school districts) probably have ventilation rates at least as bad (if not worse) than the single room schoolhouses. These things should be properly taken care of to avoid any kind of nuisance to the neighbourhood.

Lighting

Lighting and windows in the classroom are associated with student achievement. Today, improving student performance and health through better day lighting strategies can be cost ...