I woke up a little earlier than usual recently, so I decided to spend a few minutes surfing one of the more active SFUSD educators’ pages while I drank my tea.
Curious about other schools’ experiences with rodents. I have been averaging one dead in a trap per week (in my classroom) for the last month, and droppings everywhere, every single day. Every. Single. Day. We are diligent about cleaning and making sure there’s no food on the floor etc but these mice don’t care.
Does anyone know the protocol for cleaning mouse droppings or how things should be cleaned after a mouse dies in a trap? What is the district protocol?
I swept up a little less than a cup of poop today during instructional time.
Glancing up from my screen, I thought about screaming into the darkness outside my window.
I cannot name one SFUSD school site that is not currently battling a rat or mouse infestation. Any time there’s construction in a neighborhood, every rodent in a four-block radius goes house-hunting at the nearby schools.
It’s enough to make you wish they would set the coyotes loose in schools each night.
I kept scrolling. The moon mocked me.
Other teachers responded.
Why are you touching the rat droppings? Are you wearing gloves? A mask? Are your site’s work orders being ignored? File a grievance! File a grievance! File a grievance!
The idea that our union leaders would time away from their Hamas cosplay to file and follow up on actual worker grievances struck me as adorable.
Ever since a teaching credential in California became a post-baccalaureate affair, most teachers in SFUSD have at least one advanced degree. But I’m not aware of any credentialing programs with a practicum in rat-dropping removal.
I didn’t feel much like eating breakfast at this point, but like so many things on the Internet, this thread was hard to look away from.
The idea of SFUSD spending $225 million in bond money building a central kitchen and going into the food service business made my stomach clench.
I kept scrolling.
Our site is under construction and it is a huge problem! The rats are enormous!
This was an open secret at our site for almost a year: A teacher found an aquarium in the storeroom and turned it into a home for the new classroom pet. The sixth graders loved it. They named it Ratatouille — to protect its identity.
I distinctly remember my first year teaching in SFUSD, grading papers at my classroom desk after school. I was shocked to see a mouse scuttle along under the room-length radiator, wearing a white plastic spoon as a helmet.
Now it barely makes me even blink, but it still pisses me off.
As their coffee kicked in, other teachers began weighing in. Some suggested contacting the Department of Public Health. Others pointed to parents’ right to know about the problem.
I would not sweep up the droppings yourself. If you do, do not do so during the school day when students are present (or will be present, if it’s your break or planning period). And definitely open all the windows and wear a proper fitting ventilator. It’s not very common, but rodent droppings can carry hanta virus, which people then get from breathing the air in the vicinity of the droppings. Sweeping causes it to become airborne. A large percentage of people who get hanta virus don’t survive. Insist on having a professional take care of it. I would make a big stink to the school and the district. The presence of rodents and droppings is not just gross, it puts the health and safety of students and staff at risk.
Somebody pointed out that an autopsy revealed that hanta virus was the cause of Gene Hackman’s wife’s death.
Nothing jumpstarts my day like the possibility of dying from an in-school epidemic of a rodent-borne virus.
My mind turned to 2024’s Proposition A, the school bond measure. In case you’ve forgotten, that was two superintendents ago. I thought about Matt Wayne’s presentation about the bond. In presenting it, he painted a rosy picture about the largest-dollar item on the list — $225 million set aside to build “a new central food hub for Student Nutrition Services to ensure food security and healthy meals for all SFUSD students.”
The idea of SFUSD going into the food service business when it can’t — or doesn’t — keep the rats and mice under control in its classrooms … made my stomach clench.
Several colleagues offered a different avenue to consider.
This is a Cal OSHA complaint [California Division of Occupational Safety and Health].
Send email to equity@sfusd.edu with “Williams Complaint” in the subject line, and in the body of the email, explain the problem, and attach photographs.
And another colleague very nicely pointed out:
The rodent droppings are potentially quite hazardous.
None of this was improving my appetite, but by this point, as with so much of the Internet, it was impossible to tear myself away.
I found this from CDC: How to Clean Up After Rodents
Well … at my school the giant rats ate the little mice. So yeah … it is disgusting. Rats everywhere.
Department of Health.
At this point, it was time to take a shower. I packed a roll of paper towels, extra plastic bags, a container of disinfectant wipes, two KN95 masks, and several sets of nitrile gloves in a grocery bag because isn’t this why I got into teaching?
