CRI Attends School Building Expo - Carpet's Stake In Education

Carpet’s Stake in Education, served up Pittsburgh-style!

On behalf of the Carpet and Rug Institute, I spent the early part of this week in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania at School Building Expo, a conference and exhibition for people who design, build, administrate, and/or maintain school facilities. The event was designed for planners and managers from the entire education market, from k-12 to college and university-level.

I was on my own, manning the CRI booth (see photo below) – so I wasn’t free to walk around to see the other exhibits or listen to the speakers’ presentations. I’ll have to limit my comments to just my little corner of the market, so to speak, but I can certainly report on how people responded when I asked their opinions about using carpet in schools.

It’s important to understand that the education market is an important one for the carpet industry. According to American School and University Magazine, carpet use in education facilities rose from 31% to 36% between 2004 and 2006. Lots of things make carpet a great floor covering for education facilities, like increased comfort and energy efficiency, enhanced acoustics, and reduced slip and fall accidents and their related injuries.

Check out this article from Sanitary Maintenance magazine for a good overview of carpet in schools.

No one I spoke to at School Building Expo said they didn’t like carpet in schools or didn’t recognize its obvious benefits. But I did run into one tough nut from the East Brunswick, NJ school system who told me his problem was maintaining the trained staff necessary to keep carpet clean. I told him about a study that shows carpet can actually cost less over time compared to hard-surface floors.

And another study that linked carpet with increased learning in a Washington, DC school. I think I may have made some progress getting CRI’s message across.

I spoke with a designer for a group of charter schools who said her students loved stopping up toilets and making water fountains onto waterfalls too much for her to use carpet as much as she would like. Oh well, you can’t win them all.

One school maintenance director asked for information to help him respond to a teacher who produced a note from her doctor that said her classroom’s carpet was making her sick. I gave him my card and referred him to, among other things, a study done by toxicologist and author Dr. Mitch Sauerhoff that disproves the myth of a connection between carpet and increased asthma and allergy symptoms.

Everyone liked CRI’s publication, Carpet Cleaning Tips for Dummies. This little booklet is a valuable repository of information on how to keep carpet clean. It connects commercial and residential users to information on CRI’s Seal of Approval testing and certification program for carpet cleaning products and equipment.

I must say a word about the city where the conference was held. First, there was the world-class David L. Lawrence Convention Center overlooking the Allegheny River. The graceful steel and glass structure is the U.S’s first and only LEED Gold meeting facility.

I found Pittsburgh to be a vibrant, beautiful city filled with people who exhibit a pronounced joie de vivre, especially in the area of sports. On Tuesday night, June 2, I witnessed hundreds of Pittsburgh Penguins fans celebrate their team’s victory in the eastern conference quarter finals of the Stanley Cup. GO Pens!

I stayed at the Hilton Pittsburgh, in a room on the eighteenth floor that afforded me a priceless view of the point where the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers join to make the Ohio.

Pittsburghers eat delightful little potato/pasta thingies called pierogies, and if you ride the circa 1877 Duquesne Incline up to Mt. Washington, you will find a selection of those delicacies and more at the Coal Hill Steak House. I had the gorgeous view for dessert.

Andrew Warhola, aka the artist Andy Warhol, grew up in Pittsburgh, and a fascinating collection of his work is housed in the Andy Warhol museum. I toured the museum – the floors were made of polished concrete and by the time I had looked at all six floors of art, my feet were tired and my back hurt. Really bad. Carpet would have been a lot more comfortable.

~ Bethany


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