Hot hot hot: Parents sound off about Geneva High School’s contest gym

How hot is too hot for a volleyball or basketball game in Geneva High School’s contest gym?

Hot enough that a basketball player slipped in her own sweat, fell and twisted her ankle.

Hot enough for the girls on a volleyball team to throw up from heat exhaustion.

Hot enough that volleyball players use inhalers to deal with the heat when only one student actually has asthma, one parent reported.

Geneva School District 304 mothers Melanie Mannon and Beth Stevenson asked the school board at its Aug. 26 meeting to address the heat problem in the high school’s contest gym.

They recommended air conditioning.

“I’m here tonight to ask the board to commit to researching some options to address the air quality in the gym and the oppressive heat,” Mannon said. “This has been a problem since the high school was built. ... I’m here to just beg the school board to address it.”

The contest gym, Mannon said, doesn’t cool down overnight.

“It sits like a brick oven,” Mannon said.

She said she did a straw poll of girls volleyball team members after they played at Neuqua Valley High School in Naperville and learned the Geneva girls all used inhalers to deal with the contest gym heat at Geneva, but only one – her daughter – actually has asthma. Mannon said Neuqua Valley’s gym also does not have air conditioning, but it was comfortable for the game.

In urging air conditioning, Stevenson said it was a safety issue.

“It was 110 in there today without any kids exercising,” Stevenson said.

Stevenson’s daughter slipped in her own sweat and fell during a basketball game.

While the district’s seven-year capital plan lists air conditioning for the gym at more than $5 million, Superintendent Andrew Barrett said the “back-of-the-napkin” estimates put it closer to $2 million.

Board President Larry Cabeen said that is expensive for a space that is not used that much in the summer.

The district has air conditioning in grade school gyms, but not for a high school contest gym that is big enough to have more than one game at a time, Cabeen said.

“We’re looking at what we can do short term that is beneficial,” Cabeen said.

His goal is to have more factual information before taking any action, Cabeen said.

“Is there anything we can do this year?” Cabeen said. “Maybe a fan. ... No real air conditioning would happen quickly.”

High school Principal Tom Rogers recast the issue as hot days popping up at the end and beginning of every school year.

“I feel very badly for students and PE staff who have to overheat in there,” Rogers said. “It’s certainly not comfortable by any means. ... I feel fortunate we only had a few days of a heat wave last week. ... We are looking at a number of things to make it more comfortable.”

The contest gym’s heat is totally dependent on the weather, he said.

One year, they could go three weeks with comfortable temperatures and the following year is 95 degrees every day, he said.

“It’s the luck of the draw,” Rogers said. “I agree with Larry that it’s a very costly venture and not something that can be done overnight. It’s not like you can go buy a window unit or install central air. ... There’s no good answer to the problem.”

The high school has been in its location since 1958. It was renovated in 1975 and updated in 2001.

“We have not done anything major since then,” Rogers said. “We are not required to have air conditioning and we are not the only one in the area that doesn’t have it.”