Elevating The Connection Between The Changing Climate And Student Success

In mid-September, I spent four days in Washington, D.C. engaging in discussions about the environment and the changing climate. In all my conversations, one crucial topic was noticeably missing: the intersection of climate … and students.

I’m not referring to the future challenges that today’s students will face as they navigate the consequences of climate-related decisions as they enter the workforce. Instead, I want to highlight the “here and now” impact on their learning and on their physical and mental health. The latest research shows the changing climate is negatively affecting our school children’s education outcomes, as increased extreme weather events, hotter temperatures, and local infrastructure not designed for these new weather patterns play a role in their daily lives.

We are seeing measurable changes in cognitive performance and standardized test results that could have a lasting impact on students’ future economic stability and success. Just as we, in each state, seriously considered and proactively responded with approaches to solve for the widespread Covid pandemic learning losses, we must similarly be proactive in addressing the losses experienced with this new, too often overlooked public health crisis, which the World Health Organization calls “the single biggest health threat facing humanity.”

Heat: Impact on learning, play, and mental health

I recently wrote about heat, as it’s an easily measured and correlated factor in human health. Last year, 2024, was the warmest on record since modern global records began being recorded in 1850.

The concern about higher temperatures isn’t just about feeling uncomfortable – the data show that heat waves are linked to cognitive decline, and heat exposure has a measurable impact on test results among our youth – disproportionately impacting the most vulnerable. In fact, in schools without air conditioning, each 1 ° F increase in school year temperature reduces the amount learned that year by one percent. This is part of a growing body of research that demonstrates how cumulative heat exposure generates long-term reductions in human capital accumulation.

Many students are experiencing this type of exposure. The US Government Accountability Office (GAO) estimated in 2020 that 41 percent of school districts lacked adequate ventilation, heating and cooling and needed to “update or replace HVAC systems in at least half their schools (about 36,000 schools nationwide).” The GAO reported schools that lacked air conditioning were in some cases adjusting schedules or allowing early dismissal when temperatures in classrooms reached 85 degrees or higher.

Another study found extreme temperatures (80 to 90 degrees Fahrenheit and above) exacerbate student absenteeism and disciplinary referrals, with the “increase on hot days primarily affect[ing] students who not only lack access to air conditioning at school, but also live in neighborhoods with low levels of residential air conditioning.”

As a heart and lung transplant surgeon, I have long cared about these impacts on my patients’ cardiovascular health.

Focus the climate lens specifically on student learning and health, and alarming issues emerge:

– Classrooms, playgrounds, and practice fields all feel the heat, quite literally. This is especially true in urban core centers where heat islands skyrocket temperatures nearly 10 degrees higher than more treed communities. Classrooms reach temperatures approaching 100 degrees, as some schools in Philadelphia have experienced. Schools with no air conditioning in gyms that are hotter than the outside heat index play PE-style games around desks in cooler classrooms. Learning in these environments is not just difficult, it’s miserable.

– School districts delay the year’s start. Closing school and early dismissal also occur due to classroom heat. Since hot temperatures are trending to last longer into the year, these situational delays and cancellations are not sustainable.

– Recess is cancelled and playgrounds are being replaced. Movement at recess is necessary for child development, focus, memory, and emotions. Yet heat is cancelling recess. I see it in my hometown of Nashville as recess was moved indoors or shifted to shorter timeframes. Schools and communities are also re-thinking beloved playground space and moving into more natural settings. Yet, these expenses are not always an option, especially in communities already unequally impacted by heat island phenomena.

– P.E. and sports practice are increasingly dangerous. High schools to elementary schools – as well as their state lawmakers – are considering significant updates to outdoor and practice policies to account for the progressively hotter temperatures and to mitigate tragedies. Heat-related incidents most often occur in August and students can have a challenging time knowing how to communicate their exhaustion.

This is just heat. Climate change also spurs other extreme weather events that close schools for prolonged periods of time or cause trauma that diminishes learning. The Los Angeles wildfires that continue to burn in parts of the city closed approximately 80 schools in the district for multiple days and badly burned or destroyed three schools preventing them from reopening. Another five schools were destroyed in the nearby Eaton wildfire. Thousands of students have been deeply affected.

Extreme Weather and Our Students

After Hurricane Florence in 2018, researchers looked at North Carolina elementary and middle school testing data over multiple years, and found that school closures from Hurricane Florence negatively impacted outcomes for nearly all students (closures lasted half a day to 26.5 days depending on level of damage). Only high performing students (top 20% of their class) did not see a drop off in academic performance. And here we sit with a one-two punch from Hurricanes Helene and Milton that closed schools for weeks in September and October last year.

These effects matter to all of us. In particular, historically low-income, minority students are disproportionately impacted by heat and weather. That same Hurricane Florence research found the academic performance of racial and ethnic groups other than White students were affected most by school closures.

So here is my charge to today’s policymakers, education leaders, and concerned citizens: We pay attention to education co-factors including mental health, tech usage, economic resources, and physical health. We must now add climate, the downstream effects of which impact each of these areas already recognized as direct contributors to student success.

Wins to Highlight and Scale

As we did some digging around for answers and effort, we found a few wins.

Thanks to The Trust for Public Land, more than 300 school playgrounds in 23 states and on tribal lands are now safer play spaces. These Community School Yards are cooler, more shaded, and incorporate more nature. They hold the potential to promote health, support learning, and offer more park space to entire communities. Imagine if spaces like this could occupy portions of the nation’s two million acres of land where public schools sit that often have few trees. This is a solution to pursue.

We also met the leaders of UndauntedK12, a climate-focused non-profit, including Jonathan Klein who launched the group following his young daughter’s interest in addressing climate change. His advocacy work is coupled with a commitment to tracking data as displayed in the group’s continuously updated map of extreme weather events that lead to school closures and therefore lost learning time. The resources at UndauntedK12 are numerous, practical and pragmatic. And they have shared them with more than 2,000 districts and climate leaders in 37 states in 2024. Of note, UndauntedK12 raises awareness and publishes toolkits for school districts to learn about reimbursements for HVAC updates under the Inflation Reduction Act, as adequate air conditioning is a difference-maker in addressing the negative impacts of heat waves.

And to my fellow physicians, I applaud the American Academy of Pediatrics for making the asthma, allergies, and mold exposure that come with increased weather events a focus of their annual meeting this past September, raising concern over the potential for increased numbers of health consequences in our youngest students.

What can we do next?

Climate touches everything and all of us. Because it does, it will take the work of those of us whose job descriptions or personal interests may not have previously driven us to act. The effects are real, and they are real today in the most cherished places like our children’s classrooms.

It’s time to elevate the conversation about the impacts of a changing climate on student learning and student success and to take action. It will change the everyday life of today’s students who will grow up to make tomorrow’s policies.

Dr. Bill Frist is a physician, former U.S. Senate Majority Leader, and advocate for health and environmental sustainability. He is founder and chair of Tennessee’s State Collaborative on Reforming Education (SCORE) and the global board chair of The Nature Conservancy, the largest conservation organization in the world.