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Buhler Grade School passes environmental test

February 21, 2012|By Melissa Scheffler & Rebecca White | KWCH 12 Eyewitness News

(BUHLER, Kan.) — A letter sent home with Buhler Grade School students Tuesday, may provide some relief for parents and teachers.  But it didn’t provide many answers.  The letter says Buhler Grade School is safe.  This follows weeks of indoor environmental testing.

"I'm appreciative they acted on it as fast as they did,” parent Angie Ely said.

Ely worries about the high number of cancer cases involving teachers and staff at the grade school.

"I actually sent an email to the superintendent,” Ely said.

FactFinder 12 has learned more than a dozen teachers and staff members in the district have been diagnosed with cancer in recent years.  Just last year, a first grade teacher and a second grade teacher died of cancer.  At the beginning of this month, after parents stepped forward, the district hired American Metropolitan Environmental to investigate the grade school.

"I went to school here as a kid and I was worried about our future, my sister's future... so yeah, it was a very scary deal,” parent Sara Sollers said.

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Eyewitness News wanted to get more information about those test results.  But the school district would not give American Metropolitan Environmental permission to speak about those results, until a public meeting Thursday night.

The district says the company took surface and air samples from the school to test.  Even though the district says the results show a safe school, this doesn't ease the concerns about the Buhler community for some parents.

"I'm sure they are going to be a lot of concerns people are going to have as to what's happening and if there's a commonality between what's going on with the health of the teachers,” Ely said.

The district has not said what type of testing was done at the school.  The company that did the environmental testing will explain the results and answer questions this Thursday.  The meeting will be inside the grade school's gym at 5:30.

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