LThis phenomenon occurs after several days of good weather. When leaving the Modeste-Testas school in Bordeaux, parents worry that their children’s clothes and school bags, as well as their shoes, are sometimes covered in “white dust”. This bearing can be found in places where they have been in contact with the ground,…
LThis phenomenon occurs after several days of good weather. When leaving the Modeste-Testas school in Bordeaux, parents worry that their children’s clothes and school bags, as well as their shoes, are sometimes covered in “white dust”. This deposit can be found in places where they were in contact with the ground if they were kneeling or sitting. It happens that, according to one mother, you can find them “on clothes really everywhere” if they have been playing or running on the playground, which is, after all, perfect for it.
This problem does not affect the entire school group on rue Delbos in Bacalan, but only the elementary school’s courtyard, which covers about half of its area. Nothing like that in kindergartens, where the covering is referred to as “rubber”.
Failure to open
After talking about this “concrete dust” again at the school board on March 7, the students’ parents, through their association Mo’Asso, sent an email to the municipality asking “that the intervention be planned for the Easter holidays at the latest. This “defect recorded since opening three years ago” of the facility, they recall, was the subject of a May 2022 report from the National School Health and Safety Inspectorate, which City Hall reported on. The questions surrounding this dust are not new. They emerged from the very first school board in November 2021.
“There is no lead in it, no harmful material,” reassures Sylvie Schmitt, the deputy mayor in charge of education, children and youth. “This dust can cause discomfort such as allergies or colds. » Aware that “the children and the entire educational community” can no longer be revealed, the city, in this case its technical services, will meet “on site in mid-April” with the company that made the floor of this yard, as. and also the architectural agency that was chosen at that time as the project manager for this Bordeaux Métropole project, also present at this meeting. “Just before the holidays,” specifies the elected official.
Finding the solution
“Due to the lack of responsiveness of the company, which has not yet proposed any effective solution, the technical services of Bordeaux Métropole are preparing a complaint procedure,” says Sylvie Schmitt in her written response to parents. The company in question has already been asked to fix this “abnormal coating degradation” forming a “dust film”. In June 2022, she carried out a “mechanical cleaning with a sweeper” followed by a “hardener application”. “Resin”, say the parents, which lasted for a while, but “a year later” the dust reappeared.
A new search for a solution: “The project manager contacted the company that made this floor and asked them to contact their supplier,” says Sylvie Schmitt. He restarted it several times but no response from her. » If this file drags, at least there is an explanation.