By Justin Hsieh, Staff Writer
For years teachers at FVHS have reported issues with rats in their classrooms. Here is a look at what kind of experiences they’ve had.
“I’ve opened the cupboards and [had] rats come out and run across my foot,” said science teacher Michele Dow. “I have had custodians put rat traps in my room to catch them, and at one point I came in and there was a dead rat by my front door… I’ve had at least four to five rats caught in one of my cupboards where the sinks come out… My record so far is two rats caught in one week.”
The rats are especially attracted to any and all food or edible material left in the classroom, according to Dow. Dow has had lab supplies, plant seeds, lunch boxes and even food in her desk eaten by rats. The rats will chew holes into bags, get inside cabinets and drawers and climb on desks and tables to get food.
“I had a situation where I came back from summer break,” said Spanish teacher Todd Yarnton. “I opened up one of my drawers that had my lesson plan books and they all had been shredded. A rat or mouse had chewed them up to make a little nest, and for years after that I would come in and have to Lysol my desk because of urine or little rat droppings.”
When a teacher finds a rat in their classroom, they report it to the custodial staff, whose general response procedure is to remove the rat, clean up the area and install or reset a trap.
“I’ve caught two rats so far in my room [this year],” said science teacher Deborah Brown. “There’s always evidence around of rats… I literally have rat traps behind my desk right now. When I first moved in to this room, the cabinet in the back was full of rat droppings… But maintenance will totally take care of it; they’re really good about it.”
The rats are the most common in the science halls, where they have been infiltrating and leaving droppings for years. Dow estimates that the science rooms together catch an average of one rat a week.
“It’s something we have dealt with on a regular basis but not everybody realizes,” said Dow. “I don’t think it really came to the entire staff’s attention until they started doing the environmental testing of the ducts [for the gas leak] and they discovered rat droppings in various locations. People were surprised and I was like, ‘What do you mean? We have rats all the time. And so I realized not everybody was dealing with it; it was kind of an us over here thing.’”
While teachers have said that the company contracted to conduct environmental testing for the school identified the rats as a problem and recommended that they address it, FVHS Head of Maintenance Javier Ruiz says that the rats do not constitute a problem.
“There is not a rat problem on campus, but there are rats sometimes,” said Ruiz. “And when there is a rat, a teacher calls me and I’ll take care of it and that’s it.”
This article was originally published in the April 2019 issue of the Baron Banner.
