I try to anticipate where problems and concerns my arise and occasionally find myself blind-sided. Such was the case when 30 or so of our Kindergarten students, suddenly, came down with what appears to be insect bites. The problem was of such significance that we closed the kindergarten classrooms and brought in a professional property restoration company to make sure that all porous materials and free of insect infestation. It turns out that this company plans to take all of the material in the classroom to a facility in the East Bay that will “Freeze-dry” the contents and kill all bugs and eggs. Thus we will not have to use chemicals to eradicate the problem.

Thus far we have ruled out Bed Bugs as the culprit. We hired a company called Scenttek in Millbrae to bring in a dog who can detect bed bugs. All was negative in the classrooms, which in this case, is a good thing. We know that it is not bed bugs. I didn’t know that there were bed bug smelling dogs out there. At this point, we do not know what caused the recent outbreak. There are lots of suggestions about the source of the bites but nothing  that we can be certain about. What we do know is that since moving the students out of the classrooms and off of the kindergarten play structure,  there have been no new reports of bites.

In addition to the Dog searching for bed bugs, we also hired a Professor of Entomology from U.C. Davis to investigate what insects are around campus that could have caused the problem. He took numerous samples on adhesive paper and samples of the wood chips in the play structure area. The district also sent samples to an independent lab for analysis. We are waiting for results from these sources.

–Phil Lind, Principal