Anne Marie McConway on Fresh Air, Fresh Start: Health in EY Settings

‘We don’t let children drink dirty water, so why are we letting them breathe dirty air?’

Anne Marie McConway spent 9 years working in primary schools as a class teacher. After completing her Masters in Education, she moved into Higher Education teaching, where, since 2017, she has taught the Early Childhood Development and Learning Undergraduate degree at CU Coventry. She also works for Kendal College delivering a Teaching Assistant qualification.
Anne Marie has worked with Coventry University ITT trainees, authored online PGCE Primary course content for the Future Learn platform and spoken at the NITE annual conference.
Anne Marie also works with the Long Covid Kids charity, advocating for improving indoor air quality in educational settings and raising awareness of the ongoing impact of Covid on children.

In this session, Anne Marie McConway explains why indoor air quality deserves far more attention in early years settings than it currently gets. Drawing on research, historical practice and her work with the Long Covid Kids charity, she sets out what indoor air quality actually means, how a simple CO2 monitor reveals what’s happening in your room, and the low-cost steps that make a genuine difference to children’s health, wellbeing and attendance.

In this episode you’ll:

• Discover why indoor air can be up to five times more polluted than the air outside
• Learn how a CO2 monitor tells you when your room needs more ventilation, and what the numbers mean
• Find out what Florence Nightingale and the Macmillan sisters already knew about fresh air a century ago
• Understand the real scale of long Covid in children, including recent ONS figures
• See how filtering and ventilating your setting could reduce illness and raise attendance

Watch the full interview to find out how a CO2 monitor, an open window and a HEPA filter could improve health, wellbeing and attendance in your setting.

Episode Links:

https://linktr.ee/annemariemcconway

https://www.linkedin.com/in/anne-mcconway-30665b161

The Green Party Clean Air/Covid/Long Covid policy flatpack:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1jUO-FvcPUM0FsDj2aS7AKb537JZ7OtoX/edit

Long Covid Kids website with educational resources:
https://www.longcovidkids.org/

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/health-protection-in-schools-and-other-childcare-facilities/preventing-and-controlling-infections

A totally brilliant video from Prof Cath Noakes: https://youtu.be/Cgo17M6bBdU?si=gq0LmmqQzPzV9rsK

Air Filter websites

Clean Air Stars https://cleanairstars.com/

House Fresh https://housefresh.com/

SAMHE website advice https://samhe.org.uk/resources/air-cleaning-devices#hepa-filter