Every Wednesday morning at 7 a.m., General Environmental Services arrives at to continue the fight against the creatures that roam our school. You may have seen a mouse live or in a trap. You may have seen the holes they create or the droppings they leave. The rodent problem is becoming evermore present.“I don’t think more than a couple of weeks will go by before there is a sighting,” said English teacher Jenee Ramos, who has a serious mouse phobia.Multiple factors contribute to a rodent infestation of the school building. According to the National Pest Management Association, rodents enter buildings through almost any opening or crack in search of food, warmth or shelter.
Once a mouse or evidence of one has been spotted by a faculty member, Assistant Headmaster Hal Mason explains that an informal email is sent to him. He then transfers the notice into the complaint logbook, which the exterminator reads and reacts to accordingly.
According to Mason, the exterminator’s job is to survey the school building and grounds for evidence of rodents and for locations where rodents could enter. The exterminator then sets traps and makes suggestions of how the problem can be quelled. Under the Child Protection Act passed in Massachusetts in 2000, pesticides can not be used for the removal of insects or rodents on school property due to their proximity to children.
When the exterminator’s suggestions involve physical improvements, the school custodial staff and the Brookline Parks and Open Space Division are alerted to the necessary maintenance needed. However, Mason explains that recommendations are more often centered around the necessity for food to not be eaten in places besides designated food consumption areas.
“A kid or a teacher eating a muffin or bagel, even a conscientious one, is going to be leaving pieces of food on the floor,” said Mason. “What looks like a sesame seed to you or me looks like a meal to a mouse. That is all it takes: a little bit of food, and that will bring them in.”
Earlier in the year, social studies teacher Marcie Simon sent out an email to faculty members expressing her desire to strictly enforce a previously-instated “no eating in hallways or classrooms” rule due to the increased number of mice she had come into contact with. She explained that the conversation degenerated into jokes centered around what she considers to be a very important issue.
“The mice are bothering me,” said Simon, “and the fact that we can’t stick to a rule bothers me.”
“It has certainly become a more talked-about issue among the staff,” said Mason. “Apparently, eating in the hallways had been common in the past, and at one point the pest problem got so bad that Dr. Bob said nobody could eat in the hallways. Since then, people haven’t been as vigilant on that. There is a little bit of a push back to stop students from eating as much in the hallways and in classes. But that is only one part of the problem. It’s not just students: it is teachers and staff as well.”
A chart of the school that indicates where mice or evidence of them have been reported, spotted or trapped, indicates that almost every first floor room is marked, as is every office where faculty members may eat.
Simon explained that on that particular day, there was a dead mouse somewhere in the social studies department office. Due to the smell, the windows had to be opened until the issue was properly dealt with.
According to the complaint logbook, a similar situation occurred in room 200 when a deceased mouse could not be located. Because of the unbearable smell, classes were relocated until the problem was resolved.
School Within a School, located on the fourth floor, has seen a particularly large influx of mice within the past four weeks, said School Within a School Coordinator Dan Bresman. Due to the social nature and community activity of SWS, more eating tends to take place in classrooms.
Bresman believes there has been increased rodent activity throughout the whole school but is unsure of the cause.
“I don’t think the building is more dirty or the behavior or the cleanliness is any worse than it was last year, so I don’t know why it would be,” said Bresman.
SWS has enforced strict rules banning students from eating in any room without the presence of a teacher, along with placing a central garbage can in the hallway where all food and food products should be placed.
“It is too bad if it limits our ability to spend nice community time together, but it goes into another type of issue: a health and safety issue,” said Bresman. “It supersedes other concerns, so we have no choice. We have to respond to it in a way that limits the food and tries to help us get to a state where there are less mice around.”
Although rodents can be a threat to the health of students and faculty members anywhere, a larger emphasis is being placed on the control and removal of rodents in areas where food is prepared and served: the cafeteria, Restaurant 108 and the Muddy River School Store and Café.
Brookline Assistant Director of Public Health Patrick Maloney explained that biannual routine inspections are conducted in these areas to ensure management of health, proper food production, and food storage and cleanliness. In accordance with the food service codes established by the Department of Public Health, public food service establishments are also carefully reviewed for insects, rodents and further animal control.
“Looking at my complaint log, I don’t see anything recently out of this school,” said Maloney when referring to complaints of rodents. “So am I missing something? Are people complaining internally there?”
Ramos currently opts to eat at her desk, surrounded by five mouse traps, instead of in the English department’s lunchroom, due to the number of mice she has spotted. After an encounter with a mouse after school one day, Ramos is uncomfortable, fearful and not satisfied with the current situation of mice at the school.
“I personally don’t necessarily feel that it is better,” said Ramos. “I think we have a pretty serious problem, but there are definitely efforts around. I just don’t think that our efforts are actually accomplishing as much as we’d like.”
Simon is also not satisfied.
“It’s disgusting. It is a sanitation issue,” said Simon. “I mean, we eat in our homes and we don’t have mice there, so I don’t understand.”
A routine inspection of the Muddy River School Store and Café conducted by Jared Orsini on Oct. 28, 2010 resulted in a partial comply with two critical violations. The School Store and Café failed the insect, rodent and animal control test. The comments read, “Rodent droppings observed in candy area, chewed product found, order discarded.” No reported inspections have been conducted since then.
An inspection of Restaurant 108 conducted on April 25, 2011 revealed the same issue. Although the restaurant passed, mouse droppings were found in the bakery area, and the restaurant was asked to clean and sanitize the area. Recent inspections of Restaurant 108 and the cafeteria in October of this year had no reported violations involving rodents.
“We keep this place spotless. I demand it,” said career and technology education teacher Paul Carpenter, coordinator of the Restaurant 108 program. “But when it gets cold, we will get a run. We catch them all.”
According to Carpenter and Mason, there was one incident at the beginning of the year in the restaurant involving what Mason referred to as “a larger-scale fella.” Carpenter closed the restaurant immediately after rat droppings were found. The location of its entrance point, thought to be a chewed window screen, was identified and repaired. The Brookline Health Department was not contacted about this incident.
“The only way to get rid of rodents is to deny them access. That is what I try to do. Every hole, every nook and cranny that they can get into, you have to plug it up,” said Carpenter. “But you are never going to get them out of this building. We keep the place clean, we keep traps everywhere and we control them. But this building is so big. How are you going to do that to the whole building?”
Kerry Grove can be contacted at [email protected].
