Wi-Fi in Our Schools: Avoid the Risk 1


The Glendale Unified School District is working on a bond proposal to raise funds for classroom improvements, including more educational technology. This will likely involve installing or upgrading school networks. While state-of-the-art wireless networks are probably cost-effective in the short term, the GUSD board should be aware that school systems in other countries have dismantled their wireless networks and replaced them with fiber optics because of health concerns.

This Canadian broadcast on wi-fi dangers in schools features contentious school board meetings, students and parents concerned about radiation exposure, sharp criticism of current Canadian safety standards by a U.S. expert (standards in the U.S. aren’t any stricter), and a report on a community in France which has dismantled all its school wireless systems and replaced them with fiber-optic wired systems.

Germany has officially warned its citizens to avoid wi-fi; the French National Library in Paris removed its wi-fi system, and other countries and school systems have taken similar steps (the EMF Safety Network has a partial list here).

Other resources and links on the health impacts of wireless technology radiation:
The EMF Journal’s list of Bans or Warnings against Wireless Technology
The People’s Initiative Foundation

Dr. Magda Havas has been warning about the biological harm from wireless technology radiation for years. Her recent talk in the LA area was covered by Sunroom Desk. Days ago The Kingston Whig Standard in Canada published another feature on Havas’ work.

The incomplete list of experts and links on this blog, including Dr. Havas, Dr. Devra Davis (who just published Disconnect), Dr. David Carpenter (the U.S. expert mentioned above), and feature articles such as Are Cell Phones and Wi-Fi Hazardous to Your Health? in last week’s Huffington Post, is still enough to provide plenty of information that should make the Glendale School Board reconsider any continuing investment in wireless networks now installed, and go the route of replacing them with safer, faster, more secure, fiber-optic networks.

GUSD should avoid the “rush to all things wireless” and make a better, long-term investment in its students and educational technology using fiber-optic wired hardware.


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