'It's all in the building': Teacher Warns of Mold When Students Return to School

BALTIMORE COUNTY (WBFF) - As many Maryland students begin returning to school, a Baltimore County teacher has a warning about what could be waiting for some of them.

In 25 years of teaching, Maureen Hall has collected boxes of items. Some contain teaching awards and certificates of educational excellence. But looking back over those 25 years, her boxes of awards are not what’s had the greatest impact on her life.

Project Baltimore spoke with Hall in August. Eight years ago, her career took her from western Maryland to Parkville Middle School in Baltimore County to be closer to her family. In 2016, Hall, who has run nearly 30 marathons, started getting sick.

“The story needs to be told. It needs to be told. There needs to be accountability,” said Hall. “I know the truth, and I know this, I wasn't sick when I started there, and this just kind of snowballed over the last couple years.”

Hall’s health got so bad, she went to a doctor who determined she was “exposed to mold in her school triggering a variety of symptoms,” including headaches, asthma, abdominal pain, malabsorption, adrenal dysfunction and celiac disease.

“Two percent of the population have an allergic reaction to molds. It's called mold sickness. And so, unfortunately, I'm two percent of that population,” said Hall. “So, what happened to me, it triggered this autoimmune response.”

With her health deteriorating, Hall began documenting the problem by collecting pictures and mold samples from the school in boxes. She filed reports to alert administrators. And a Project Baltimore investigation found she wasn’t alone. Fox45 News has obtained years of emails from Parkville Middle School that indicate there’s a problem.

In an email from the fall of 2018, a Parkville teacher explains how, “many teachers have complained of health issues that they believe is (sic) related to the existence of mold in our building.” A form was even created to “report the mold”, which according to emails, was found in “chairs”, a “door frame” a “freezer/fridge” and “exhaust vents.”

“We had mold all over the desk. We had mold growing in the flag. We had mold growing in the concrete. So, it's all in the building,” said Hall.

ALSO READ | Parents upset about mold in Parkville Middle School

Parkville’s principal wrote an email referring to mold as “community concerns” and Parkville’s assistant building operation supervisor sent an email about “battling mold in the building.”

The concerns go back at least to a 2002 email, in which Parkville’s assistant principal requested an air quality test to “address her staff’s concerns.”

“It’s very upsetting. Like I say to my doctors, I want my life back. And I feel like I can't be part of a system that does not take care of their teachers and their students,” said Hall.

In March 2019, seven months after complaints were first filed, an “air quality assessment” was done at Parkville Middle School.

Project Baltimore reached out to Baltimore County, asking what took seven months to test the school? They declined an interview but said in a statement, “Upon being alerted to possible mold growth at Parkville Middle School in 2018, the BCPS facilities teams immediately cleaned the school and resolved the issue. An independent, third-party check of the school was conducted in February 2019 as a follow-up and found no evidence of mold.”

Fox45 obtained a copy of that February 2019 report. While it found no “significant mold growth”, mold was found in crawlspaces and in room 215. The report even recommends the “mold growth” be further investigated.

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“They say they protect their students, and they say that we put our students first, but they're not,” said Hall. “They're not putting students first. They're not putting teachers first.”