We Enlisted a Community to Help Us Report on One State’s Crumbling Schools. Here’s How You Can Do the Same.

Schools had received inspections, but they were mostly surface level and sparse in detail, primarily focused on clear worker safety issues rather than an exhaustive facilities review. For example, Becca visited a Boundary County school where she saw buckets taped to pipes to catch leaks and heard that the maintenance director had to blow snow off the roof to prevent it from collapsing again. In comparison, the inspection report’s only reference to the roof was linking to a federal alert about preventing injury during snow removal. It also didn’t show the impact on students and staff.