Custodians Keep the School Clean

— Michael Pfliger, Sports Editor

Mandan High School is 178,224 square feet and to maintain all that, a custodial staff of 8 people works to keep the place in nice condition. The staff work from about 5:15 am until about 11:30 pm in order to maintain the school’s appearance.

“We usually get here at 5:15 and our staff leaves at 11:30,” Custodian supervisor Eric Varriano said.

The staff work inside the building, outside in the parking lots, and practice fields. However there are different custodial crews that maintain the Braves center and the all seasons arena.

Custodians work year round to ensure the school is ready for the school year. The staff works different hours during the summer compared to during the school year.

“We are here all summer. We wax floors and paint walls before things get all dinged up during the year,” Varriano said.

A custodians’ work often ramps up during the summer to ensure everything is ready for the stress placed upon it during the school year. They also use the time to replace and mend things that were damaged during the school year and to add things to improve the overall quality of the school.

“Summers are our busiest times we clean all the classrooms pull everything out strip hallways and re-wax the hallways,” custodial supervisor Nathan Fetting said.

Custodians do much more than just pick up trash. They also make repairs to things that need it, such as toilets, TV’s, and other things around the school that might need repairs.

“We do all the maintenance here like the TV’s fix the toilets and stuff like that,” Fetting said.

The custodial staff also maintains around the school and in the parking lots but not other places like the ASA and Braves Center. Those places have their own staff and their own custodial heads.

“We are just the building the braves center, ASA and the grounds all have their own crew,” Fetting said.

Even though the custodial staff are here from 5-11 they work in different shifts with one getting off at 3 and the other getting off at 11:30.

The custodial staff mainly spends their time cleaning classrooms and picking up garbage around the school and in the surrounding parking lots. Students can help the custodial staff by decreasing the amount of trash they leave in the ground in the parking lots and classrooms.

“The parking lots are the worst area to clean up. Just pick up trash and if you make a mess, clean it up,” Fetting said.