Tackling Air Pollution at School - The Dynamic Classroom

The Dynamic Classroom is an interdisciplinary pilot project that will investigate how the school classroom learning environment can be improved by reducing the indoor air pollution exposure of school children and staff.

The project will be run by an interdisciplinary team from six universities and two industry partners, with expertise in air quality, atmospheric science, instrument development, building services management, building information systems, modelling, project management, and social science methods.

Over one-year, with two intensive ‘deep-dive’ phases, the team aim to implement and monitor one pilot ‘dynamic classroom’, in a pre-existing primary school classroom, where ventilation is controlled via an automated window system connected to air quality and weather sensors both inside and outside the classroom.

The project is based on three central research questions:
RQ1: Can a simple, automated, ‘dynamic’ approach to building management (e.g. ventilation) and alerting (dashboard), governed by air quality sensor data improve indoor air quality in a typical UK primary school classroom?
RQ2: What are the primary air pollutants (gases and particles) in and around the test classroom during the average school day, week and year?
RQ3: Can the dynamic classroom improve teachers’ and other stakeholders’ perceptions of air quality and student learning outcomes?