Are you doing everything you can to create environments where students can truly thrive and fulfil their potential?

There was a time when school cleaning was a side task that fell alongside preparing food or supervising break times. Sometimes it was simply a matter of running a mop around at the end of the day. It certainly never touched the leadership agenda.

There was a time when school cleaning was a side task that fell alongside preparing food or supervising break times. Sometimes it was simply a matter of running a mop around at the end of the day. It certainly never touched the leadership agenda.

However, since Covid19, school cleaning has been a priority. But school leaders aren’t necessarily experienced in managing cleaning and have other priorities.

However, since Covid19, school cleaning has been a priority. But school leaders aren’t necessarily experienced in managing cleaning and have other priorities.

What do you need to know?

What do you need to know?

With over 30 years’ experience of cleaning schools, Nviro has the knowledge and experience to help schools to manage their cleaning effectively to keep buildings clean, hygienic and safe to enable their students to thrive.

With over 30 years’ experience of cleaning schools, Nviro has the knowledge and experience to help schools to manage their cleaning effectively to keep buildings clean, hygienic and safe to enable their students to thrive.

For us, when people are truly thriving in an environment, they are able to focus, without any distractions, doubts or fears. From a cleaning perspective, this is made possible by ensuring that everybody who uses your space can tell that it’s clean, see proof that it’s hygienic and feel that it’s safe.

For us, when people are truly thriving in an environment, they are able to focus, without any distractions, doubts or fears. From a cleaning perspective, this is made possible by ensuring that everybody who uses your space can tell that it’s clean, see proof that it’s hygienic and feel that it’s safe.

But what does that mean?

But what does that mean?

It’s hard to teach and learn in a space that’s dirty. It’s impossible to do so in an environment that actually damages your health. And feeling unsafe has a direct impact on a person’s ability to think

It’s hard to teach and learn in a space that’s dirty. It’s impossible to do so in an environment that actually damages your health. And feeling unsafe has a direct impact on a person’s ability to think clearly, to focus and achieve. This is why school leaders need to continue to focus on the foundations of cleaning, hygiene and their impact on actual and psychological safety. clearly, to focus and achieve. This is why school leaders need to continue to focus on the foundations of cleaning, hygiene and their impact on actual and psychological safety.

Clean

Clean

Cleanliness is a sensory experience: we see it, smell it and touch it. A lack of cleanliness might manifest in a smear on a window, a rancid smell from the toilet facilities, or a sticky substance on the underside of a seat. It’s reasonably easy to check that an environment is clean –after all that’s what you pay for. But is it enough?

Cleanliness is a sensory experience: we see it, smell it and touch it. A lack of cleanliness might manifest in a smear on a window, a rancid smell from the toilet facilities, or a sticky substance on the underside of a seat. It’s reasonably easy to check that an environment is clean –after all that’s what you pay for. But is it enough?

Hygienic

Hygienic

Hygiene can’t be seen; it has to be proven. Unlike cleanliness, you can’t make instant judgments about the hygiene status of a space - that is, the presence of bacteria, viruses or pathogens.

Hygiene can’t be seen; it has to be proven. Unlike cleanliness, you can’t make instant judgments about the hygiene status of a space - that is, the presence of bacteria, viruses or pathogens.

If you see a surface that appears unclean, you might assume the surface is unhygienic, but that doesn’t mean a clean surface is always hygienic. This is the lesson that the Covid19 pandemic brought into such sharp focus. And from this we’ve learned that hygiene practices reduce illness and absence and mean your building users will be in school more often.

If you see a surface that appears unclean, you might assume the surface is unhygienic, but that doesn’t mean a clean surface is always hygienic. This is the lesson that the Covid19 pandemic brought into such sharp focus. And from this we’ve learned that hygiene practices reduce illness and absence and mean your building users will be in school more often.

Safe

Safe

Safety is something we feel. It’s the absence of fear and anxiety. Reducing anxiety is an important focus for all school leaders given the myriad of issues facing our young people. You need to be concerned with both the physical and psychological safety of your building to foster feelings of safety. Communicating the steps taken and evidencing a clean environment helps people to know they are cared for.

Safety is something we feel. It’s the absence of fear and anxiety. Reducing anxiety is an important focus for all school leaders given the myriad of issues facing our young people. You need to be concerned with both the physical and psychological safety of your building to foster feelings of safety. Communicating the steps taken and evidencing a clean environment helps people to know they are cared for.

How can you create an environment that supports students to thrive?

How can you create an environment that supports students to thrive?

To effectively deliver clean working environments, you need to be willing to enter into a collaborative and cooperative partnership with your cleaning provider.

To effectively deliver clean working environments, you need to be willing to enter into a collaborative and cooperative partnership with your cleaning provider.

While the cleaning and support team will provide the service needed to create a clean environment, here’s our top tips for creating a thriving environment.

While the cleaning and support team will provide the service needed to create a clean environment, here’s our top tips for creating a thriving environment.

1. Partner with your cleaning team

1. Partner with your cleaning team

Cleaners are often prevented from creating a clean environment in schools because they need to work around mess or disorder. Anyone who has hired cleaners for their home will know that tidying before they arrive means they can spend more time actually cleaning, rather than putting things away. The same is true in a school.

Cleaners are often prevented from creating a clean environment in schools because they need to work around mess or disorder. Anyone who has hired cleaners for their home will know that tidying before they arrive means they can spend more time actually cleaning, rather than putting things away. The same is true in a school.

3. Implement an on-going hygiene solution

Every school will have seen the dip in results and morale caused by an outbreak of flu across a year group, or a bout of norovirus that seemed to continue for weeks as it bounced from one person to another. Addressing hygiene regularly can stop that impact.

Many of the hygiene approaches developed or accelerated during the pandemic, like air filtration, antibacterial sprays, protective coatings and swab testing, can now be extended to provide protection on an ongoing basis.

4. Use a specialist partner allay the very real fears that people had. Stress and anxiety are a huge problem in a school environment and, while you cannot get rid of them entirely, the fear of illness is one contributor over which you as a school leader have some influence. If anyone in your building feels unsure that the building is hygienic, their stress and anxiety may spike.

A staffroom table littered with dirty mugs is not as easy to wipe down as one that has been cleared beforehand. Likewise, if pupils stack the chairs in their classroom at the end of the day, it allows cleaners to mop a floor far more efficiently.

To create clean working environments,

To create clean working environments, you need to be willing to enter into a collaborative and cooperative partnership with your cleaning provider. You can get much more value from a cleaning team if each room is ready for them and they are able to concentrate their efforts on cleaning, not moving furniture.

2. Prepare for the inevitable

Allowing a budget for non-standard cleaning tasks is another overlooked area in creating a clean environment. When cost is the primary procurement criteria, tasks we see as core to cleanliness are often descoped. This might include chewing gum removal and an upholstery refresh ahead of a parents’ evening.

Similarly, we advise you to make allowance for ad hoc cleaning tasks that inevitably crop up. It’s very rare to travel an academic year without an incident of graffiti or unattractive staining that needs attention. Less common but by no means unknown are those incidents that need urgent and specialist attention, like a chemical or bodily fluids spillage.

Hygiene solutions inevitably stretch an already tight budget. But they can cost more. One solution is to work with a partner that provides both cleaning and hygiene services, so you can minimise the cost by balancing both.

5. Optimise your budget can

We’ve worked hard with our clients to find ways of automating many routine cleaning tasks so that a portion of the budget can be redirected to hygiene services. Where this is possible, you will see all the benefits with a net neutral impact on the budget.

6. Communicate safety

During the height of the pandemic, it was not enough to take hygiene measures –you also had to be seen to be doing it, to

A key part of your duty of care, therefore, is to not only keep your school hygienic but communicate the measures you are taking around hygiene.

7. Ensure respect and familiarity a your and

Another factor in engendering a feeling of safety is the manner and professionalism of your cleaning teams. For example, a lone teacher encountering a person in the building after school hours needs to be able to immediately identify who they are and their purpose for being there. Equally, a pupil shouldn’t overhear bad language from cleaners or be made to feel uncomfortable. If you want your building users to feel safe, uniforms and a good standard of behaviour from your cleaning team are key.

For more information about how you could use Nviro’s Clean, Hygienic and Safe Framework to support your students to focus on learning, visit www.nviro.co.uk

Link to CHS YouTube video