All over the school, ceiling tiles can be seen falling apart every day; however, no one quite knows why this strange event occurs so frequently, nor does anyone see the work that goes into fixing them.
On Dec.18, 2024, maintenance could be seen replacing the broken ceiling tiles around campus. However, they often replace them behind the scenes.
“We try to replace them as much as we can, but it’s kind of a revolving door,” director of facilities Jeremy Harrell said. “As soon as we get caught up, there’s always other ones coming down.”
Many factors go into the amount of ceiling tiles needing to be replaced. To start, they aren’t the original ceiling tiles of the school.
“If you go with the older ceiling tiles, back when the original was built, probably asbestos,” building maintenance manager James Beard said. “They came in and they spent millions of dollars just to get the asbestos out away from the kids.”
Home and public buildings commonly use asbestos, a toxic material banned in 1989. It can cause lots of diseases, including multiple types of cancer. After that, the school had to find a new type of ceiling tile to use.
“They used to be two by fours, then they went to a fiber type, then we went from there,” Beard said. “The kids were still breaking them and it was cutting their hands up, so they went to something that’s not going to hurt the kids.”
The school constantly tries to ensure the safety of the students. However, they also have to order lots of ceiling tiles all the time.
“On average, before the school opens, we probably order around three pallets,” Harrell said. “That’s in the revolving budget, to make sure, no matter what happens, we always order pallets.”
The maintenance crew ensures that plenty of ceiling tiles get ordered to be swapped out with the old ones. They work at this every day, even if they aren’t usually seen.
“Our crew works really hard,” Harrell said. “They’re always trying to look for ways to help make this campus look as clean and as nice as we can.”
