How schools are failing our kids; childhood cases of obesity and asthma have hit record levels. Meanwhile, public schools serve hamburgers and fries, eliminate gym classes, and use pesticides. Are schools setting our kids up for a lifetime of poor health? - Exclusive Report

Because children are still developing, they are at a greater risk for potential harm from pesticide exposure, say experts. Pesticides have been linked to dizziness, nausea, and long-term neurological, developmental, and reproductive disorders, according to the EPA. In 1996, the EPA began testing already-approved pesticides to establish permissible exposure levels for infants and children, but it's a slow process. The agency expects to be only about two-thirds done by August 2002. It hopes to complete the testing by 2006, says Dave Deegan, a Washington, D.C.-based EPA spokesperson.

What You Can Do: Call and ask school officials about their air-quality and pest-management policies. If you don't like what you hear, work with other parents or contact your local PTA (to locate offices, visit www.pta.org/ptacommunity) to initiate change. You can start by suggesting the school take advantage of tools offered by the EPA. Its free Indoor Air Quality Tools for Schools kit instructs schools about how to inexpensively fix indoor-air problems. The EPA will also send a free video on how to operate and maintain ventilation systems properly. For more information, call 800-438-4318 or visit www.epa.gov/iaq/schools/index.html.

Regarding pesticides, the EPA encourages schools to adopt Integrated Pest Management (IPM) practices, which aim to minimize or eliminate the use of toxic pesticides. You can learn more about IPM by visiting the EPA website at www.epa.gov/pesticides/ipm.

On the Playground

Our children aren't faced with health threats only inside of school. They also confront them on the playground. One problem is playground equipment built from pressure-treated wood that has been preserved with chromated copper arsenate (CCA). CCA contains arsenic (an insecticide), which can leach out of wood and onto the hands and clothing of children and into the surrounding soil, says Andrew Port, an environmental health expert with the Whitman Companies in East Brunswick, N.J. Arsenic is a known human carcinogen, according to the EPA.

In February, the EPA and the wood preservation industry embarked on a voluntary phase-out of the use of CCA pressure-treated wood in most consumer products by Dec. 31, 2003; after that, the EPA will not allow its use in residential products (which includes playgrounds). Although a fix for the future, this agreement doesn't address the current problem. "Even if [the use of pressure-treated wood] were stopped today, we have millions of board feet of playground structures ... [still] in use," says Tom Lent, regional coordinator for the Healthy Building Network, an environmental and health activists group in Washington, D.C.

The EPA hasn't mandated the immediate removal of this equipment or banned its use because no conclusive evidence exists that CCA-treated wood poses a health risk, says Dave Deegan, an EPA spokesperson. Until the EPA has that evidence, it can't mandate anything. Currently, it is performing a comprehensive risk assessment of CCA and expects to release its findings for review in 2003.