Transforming the playground for a changing climate

California is starting to help public schools replace asphalt with green spaces, but childcare providers haven't gotten the same kind of support.
photo credit: Courtesy of North Bay Children's Center.
An image from the North Bay Children's Center website.

The recent October heat wave in the Bay Area has brought attention to schools, and how many of them lack air conditioning and other infrastructure to keep kids safe. The issue is even more crucial at child care centers because younger kids have a harder time adapting.

KQED’s Daisy Nguyen paid a visit to one in Sonoma County that’s trying to ensure kids can play safely when temperatures rise.

It is already 80 degrees when kids begin their day at Fitch Mountain Preschool,

"We know that by about 11:30 it's going to be extremely warm, so what we're doing is we're getting all the children out in rotations," said Teresa Fogolini.

Fogolini directs the gardening and nutrition program for North Bay Children's Center, which runs this and 13 other preschools. She says kids can play at the water table or under a tunnel-shaped willow structure before it gets too hot.

"On a hot day, you can go in and it can be as much as 20 degrees cooler...and it's a living structure, so the children are learning by watching it grow over the years," Fogolini said.

The center rents space from an elementary school in Healdsburg to operate Fitch Mountain.

About six years ago, it ripped up asphalt in the play yard and covered it with mulch, fruit trees, and garden beds.

'The only black top you see is this area where they have a trike track," Fogolini said.

And that's because studies show asphalt in school yards can reach dangerous temperatures on hot days.

Stanford pediatrician Dr, Lisa Patel says small children are especially vulnerable to heat

"Their bodies heat up more quickly, they don't have the same capacity to sweat, and they really rely upon their caretakers for their safety," Patel said.

California is starting to help public schools replace asphalt with green spaces, but Patel says childcare providers haven't gotten the same kind of support.

"The early childhood care ecosystem is so diverse and so it's hard to have a unified approach because some of them happen out of people's homes, some of them happen in larger buildings, some of them happen from a business that is offering daycare within that business or corporation," Patel said.

Susan Gilmore is the executive director of the North Bay Children's Center. She says the changes made at the Healdsburg site are a response to climate driven events that have affected the region.

"When we experience poor air quality days, extreme heat, smoke, fire nearby, what kind of building designs do we need to think about that would enable us to stay open during those kinds of events?" Gilmore said. "And also even be a resiliency hub for families that may be without power; have a poor air quality in their homes."

Some of their other sites have portable classrooms that can really heat up.

Gilmore says next year they will open a new preschool in Novato that will have backup power, air filtration, and temperature control systems. The play yard will also have plenty of shade structures.