PPA 699 Public Policy Development WK 6 Assignment

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Running Head: SCHOOL PEST CONTROL POLICY

School Pest Control Policy

PPA 699 Public Policy Development

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SCHOOL PEST CONTROL POLICY

School Pests Control Policy

Problem

Both the pests and the pesticides used to control them can be hazardous to human life and

environment. Children are the most vulnerable to the risks associated with the exposure to

pesticides than adults. Besides, they are known to have higher respiratory rate and eat more

frequently than adults. Their tendency of sprawling and eating anything from the ground is

wanting. With all these biological and cultural differences, kids can easily be subjects of

pesticides poisoning than adults. This policy is intended to analyze how to manage pest

efficiently while ensuring that the applied methods do not expose people to poisoning in a school

environment. This proactive policy will manage pest more efficiently rather than using the

predominant means of using pesticides (Phillips, 2005). The plan will apply various procedures

to control both structural and landscape pests. The systems are as detailed in the rationale of the

Integrated Pest Management (IPM) program.

The duties of the IPM system are as follows;

• Determining various species of pests and their natural predators

• Assessment of the growing populations of the pests and the predators

• Using the most non-toxic and biological methods to control pests

• Record keeping of the best remedial actions to be taken in different places depending on

the nature of the place and the type of pests.

What is a pest?

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SCHOOL PEST CONTROL POLICY

A pest is anything that causes infection to the human being and attacks crops and livestock

among many other constituents of the environment. They include arthropods like mites and ticks,

nuisance birds like weaverbird and many other undesirable organisms.

IPM Procedures

IPM is an environmentally friendly approach that relies on the application of common sense

in the process of pest management. It depends on the comprehensive information about the life

cycles of various pests to come with the best methods of controlling pests. According to

Richardson (2008), the information helps in controlling the pests most economically and posing

least possible threats to people and the environment.

Their approach also uses the understanding of survival needs of the pests thus being able to

manage them. For instance, pests seek habitats, which must provide basic needs for sustaining

life. Therefore, they can be controlled by creating an environment that lacks their necessities. In

Lisowski (2007), it states such situation can be achieved by withdrawing the basic needs from

their places or blocking them from accessing there.

Policy statement

The management of the school is committed to ensuring that the school environment is

conducive to the children and staffs. It seeks to prevent exposure of children to pests and the

pesticides. It has therefore adopted the approach used by the Integrated Pest Management. These

procedures have proved to minimize the exposure of the school fraternity to the problems

mentioned. While there may be the application of pesticides in control of pests, it is less toxic

chemicals that will be accepted.

Pest Management

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SCHOOL PEST CONTROL POLICY

The aims of the pests’ management are:

• Protect children and the staff from being exposed to health hazards

• Protect school property from being damaged by pests

• Prevent the pests from spreading to animals in the school

Education

Both the teaching staff, non-teaching staff, students and the public will be educated the

current Pests’ problem and the appropriate measures that have been adopted through the

knowledge of integrated pests’ management approach.

Record keeping

Records that will be kept include:

• Number of pests species that are within the school environment

• Indicators of continued spread of pests after treatment

• Records of any pesticide used at any given time

• Records of the areas with the highest number of pesticides

• The prevalence of specific species in the school environment

The objective of keeping these records is for evaluating the effectiveness of a given methods

and adjust appropriately. Need for improvement or maintaining of a given method is dependent

on the report of the records.

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SCHOOL PEST CONTROL POLICY

Notification

The school administration will take responsibility for notifying the students and parents on the

upcoming treatments, which may involve pesticides. Various notices will be printed and posted

in various places within and outside the school. The students will also be sent home with notices

in the form of a printed card.

Pesticide Storage and Purchase

If need be, purchases will be done in limited amounts that can be used for a specific

treatment. Besides, the storage and disposal will be done following the existing policies of local

regulations. A cabinet will be explicitly designed for storage of the pesticides before and after

use. The cabinet must be labeled with a sign indicating danger for the sake of those who do not

know how to read (Phillips, 2005).

Pesticide Applicators

These are people tasked with the role of handling pesticides within the school. They will be

educated and trained by specialists from pesticides suppliers. The supplier must be an authorized

and certified dealer in the field of pesticides. Under no single circumstance should applications

of pesticides be done in the school while learning is in progress.

Statewide application

The policy applies the rational model of policy making because it gives alternatives to the

administration and the public to solve health threat. The model needs to be adopted by all

schools since most of them are faced with similar challenges. The prevalence of pesticides

poisoning is much common in many schools. It’s also because a worth public disaster.

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SCHOOL PEST CONTROL POLICY

Therefore, the government should endeavor making this a law for to help in solving the problem.

The objection to this is inevitable but they are nullified by the magnitude of the problem.

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SCHOOL PEST CONTROL POLICY

References

Lisowski, M. (2007). Safe and healthy school environments. The Journal of Environmental

Education, 38(4), 62. Retrieved from ProQuest Database.

Phillips, M. (2005). Children's centers study kids and chemicals. Environmental Health

Perspectives, 113(10), A664-8. Retrieved from EBCOhost Database.

Richardson, R. G. (2008). Integrated pest management for crops and pastures. Plant Protection

Quarterly, 23 (2), 104. Retrieved from ProQuest Database.