Granton's Custodial Staff Working Extra Hard to Fight Coronavirus

Wednesday, March 24th, 2021 -- 3:00 PM

-The Granton School District has been working hard to keep kids in school this year, even during the time of the Coronavirus Pandemic.

A large part of Granton’s success is behind their hard working custodial staff.  In our continuing interview series, I spoke with Granton’s Interim Administrator, James Kuchta, as well Maintenance Director Robby Roehl.  They discussed ways keeping the district clean has changed this past year.

Mr. Kuchta:  “Today we have Robby Roehl who is our Maintenance Supervisors and his time with Granton goes back to high school.”

Robby:  “I graduated from here and I’ve been here almost 14 years as an employee.  At first I was just a custodian and then the last year and a half, I’ve been the Maintenance Supervisor.”

Mr. Kuchta:  “As Maintenance Supervisor, you’ve seen all the things going on over the past year plus now regarding the pandemic and making our students COVID ready, so what are some of the things you and your staff have done differently this year?”

Robby:  “Differently, I’ve had a couple part time employees come in at certain times.  One comes in for about 4 hours a day, kinda in the middle of the day, from about 9:30am-1:30pm and he goes around and wipes and disinfects handrails, doorknobs, light switches, all the things that got touched during the day."

"And then I also have another part-time guy come at night just to help out the full time custodians because they have extra cleaning they need to do, like every room getting disinfectant.”

Mr. Kuchta:  “We have these no machines that we use.  They’re a disinfectant mister.  Can you talk about that?”

Robby:  “They’re an electrostatic machine.  They’re battery powered and when you spray stuff, depending on what the surface is, the chemical will wrap around the entire surface from the electrostatic sprayer itself.”

Mr. Kuchta:  “And that’s intended to kill any virus and any germs that are there.  So, it’s a deeper cleaning that we are doing this year at Granton than has ever really been done before."

"And that’s really helped our students to stay in school since we started last August, 5 days a week, basically all year other than our virtual learning reinforcement days we’ve had every other Friday since last September.  We want to give credit where credit is due and that’s to you and your staff for doing a great job in the deep cleaning and preparing our school all year long.”

Robby:  “Our teachers help out a lot too.  Every morning I go around to each room and give them new towels and fill up their spray bottles for cleaning throughout the day inside their classrooms.”

Mr. Kuchta:  “I have noticed throughout the building, in our Elementary classrooms, our teachers have the students wipe off desks and counter spaces in our middle school inbetween class changes.  Every class change, they’re wiping off the table tops and desk areas and in the high school as well, every class change they have throughout the day.  Currently do you know how many staff or students we have out of the building for COVID?”

Robby:  “We have none at this time.”

Mr. Kuchta:  “That’s correct.  And actually, over the last couple of months, we’ve had zero staff or students that have been COVID positive or even close contact.  I think that’s a great credit to the work you and our staff have done all year long.”

Question:  “Anything else you’d like to add?”

Mr. Kuchta:  “Robby has been very active with our Strategic Planning Committee with our Action Team that’s working on facilities and finance.  So, I know he’s been taking a look at the entire facility, long range planning for everything from roofing to flooring and parking spot places."

"The community has been very fortunate to have the swimming, which they completed a referendum for a couple years ago.  And, even though that’s been closed down for this past school year, we’re looking at opening that up now within the next couple of months and holding swimming lessons again.  And Robby Roehl is the supervisor of all of that as well.”

Feel free to contact us with questions and/or comments.