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Parents with children who go to Whitesides Elementary School in Mount Pleasant were notified of an eLearning day Thursday.

MOUNT PLEASANT, S.C. (WCSC) - Parents with children who go to Whitesides Elementary School in Mount Pleasant were notified of an eLearning day Thursday.

Students and staff at Mamie P. Whitesides Elementary will be learning and working from home on Thursday, according to an email sent to parents Wednesday night.

“Out of an abundance of caution, the district will now be moving Whitesides Elementary School to eLearning for students and remote work for employees for Thursday,” the email read. “The district will work with key personnel and assess the building to ensure a safe learning environment for all students.”

This comes after the school notified parents of an apparent carbon dioxide issue on Tuesday. Parents received the following email:

Good afternoon Whitesides Families,

Due to concerns that were brought to me, our facilities team conducted air quality tests in our building. On Wednesday, October 11, and Friday, October 13, Facilities Management’s Environmental Services Industrial Hygienist collected carbon dioxide (CO2) readings at various locations in the building. The readings are well within OSHA standards for safe indoor air quality, but in some locations are higher than what is typically seen in indoor settings.

On Monday morning, October 16, an inspection of the HVAC system showed that the units that introduce outside air into the building were not performing at 100% capacity which can allow CO2 levels to stay higher. Again, although the levels are above what is seen in similar environments they are well below the level that is considered unhealthy indoor air quality. In the meantime, repairs have already been done on the outdoor air units and parts have been ordered to get them all functioning at maximum capacity as soon as possible. As an additional precaution, Facilities Management will be installing permanent CO2 monitoring devices throughout the school.

Regarding further addressing indoor air concerns, the district collected air samples in several classrooms to determine levels of indoor airborne spores. Analysis of the lab results will be received in the next week.

We will keep you updated as we receive more information, but please know that we are committed to ensuring that our building is a safe environment for all of our students and staff. Thanks and have a great night,

Michelle Conner

It’s not immediately clear if the eLearning day is a result of the air quality tests and the high CO2 levels.

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

Copyright 2023 WCSC. All rights reserved.

On this episode of Speaking of … College of Charleston, Jennifer Bradley, director of the Center for Excellence in Peer Education at the College of Charleston, talks about the College’s First Year Experience program with FYE director Jen Wright and FYE peer facilitator Gabriella Gibson.

“We challenge students in a supportive environment,” says Wright. “Our goal is to help them really challenge themselves, challenge their beliefs, challenge their knowledge, challenge their capacity for things. We want them to really fall down and struggle with things, but know that it’s OK to do so, that we’re there to support them, we’re there to make sure that they get the help that they need. We encourage students to believe that they’re capable of great things, that they’re going to find their way to where they want to be on their life path.”

Featured on this Episode:

Jen Cole Wright is a professor of psychology and director of the First Year Experience at the College of Charleston. As director of this vibrant program, she recruits talented faculty to teach first year seminars and learning communities. Wright teaches introductory courses in psychology and lifespan development, but her passion lies in courses on the psychology of human conflict and social change – teaching courses like Psychology of War and Conflict; Psychology of Oppression, Resistance and Regeneration; and Psychology of Social Change. She has been teaching in the First Year Experience program since 2009, teaching both seminars and learning communities with other faculty across campus. She has been a faculty fellow in both the Honors College and the Center for Sustainable Development.

Jennifer Bradley Smuniewski is the director of the Center for Excellence in Peer Education (CEPE) at the College of Charleston, supervising the FYE peer facilitators and assisting other offices on campus with creating and maintaining their peer education programs. She served as the associate director for CEPE for many years and also worked in the main office of the Office for the Academic Experience, now the Office for Student Success, providing direct support to the associate vice president for the academic experience. She has a bachelor of arts in organizational communication from Clemson University and a master of education in counseling and student affairs from The Citadel Graduate College.

Gabriella Gibson is a senior at the College of Charleston and will graduate with a bachelor of science in sociology with a minor in psychology. San Diego–born and East Coast–raised, she has a passion for helping others and hopes to open a private practice in acceptance and commitment therapy. She enjoys traveling around the world, discovering new music and the arts.

Resources in This Episode: First Year Experience Be a Peer Facilitator Spring 2024 Classes Faculty Invited to Get Creative With First Year Experience Courses First Year Experience Classes Offer Transformational Opportunities

CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCSC) - The chairman of the Charleston County School Board says the board will take steps if audience members do not maintain decorum during future meetings.

Chair Pam McKinney released a statement Friday saying recent meetings have seen “a significant amount of dialogue and loud voices from audience members” that make having “productive discussions” difficult.

“I acknowledge that the dialogue and loud voices are a result of community frustration,” McKinney said.

Community members have been outspoken outside of meetings and during meetings since the sudden decision on Sept. 25 to place Charleston County School District Superintendent Dr. Eric Gallien on paid administrative leave pending the outcome of an investigation. The board did not immediately explain the reason for the decision or the investigation.

But several concerned board members who did not vote in favor of placing Gallien on leave later revealed at a news conference that the investigation was called after a district employee complained of a “hostile work environment.”

Community members have rallied behind Gallien, who filed a lawsuit against the district shortly after being placed on leave. They have also demanded answers about why the board did not hire Michelle Simmons as the district’s chief administrative officer and why six members of the district’s Health Advisory Committee were removed.

“Trustees have not been able to hear each other, and interested in-person attendees and those watching the meetings online have not been able to hear the trustees over the noise of the crowd,” McKinney said.

McKinney said a notice will be posted at Monday’s meeting:

Any person in attendance at a meeting of the CCSD Board of Trustees shall conduct himself/herself in a manner appropriate to the decorum of the meeting and shall not use profane, abusive, or obscene language or otherwise engage in disorderly conduct. Any person who makes such remarks or otherwise engages in disorderly conduct which disrupts, disturbs, or otherwise impedes the orderly conduct of a Board meeting shall, at the discretion of the presiding officer, be barred from further attendance during the meeting and may be removed from the building or premises.

“The Board must be able to complete the business before it, so we have to balance the desire of the community to provide feedback with our need to fulfill the responsibilities entrusted to us,” she said.

She said she encouraged the public to provide feedback either by submitting written public comments ahead of their regular meetings, providing in-person public comments during regular meetings or emailing trustees at any time via email addresses available at the district’s website.

But she also warned that “continued crowd-level disruptions” at board meetings that interfere with the board’s ability to conduct meetings could result in a recess being called until order is restored or that the board reconvenes in “a separate location” and then live-streams the meeting into the board room for public viewing.

EDITOR’S NOTE: An earlier version of this story incorrectly reported McKinney released the statement Wednesday. That statement was released Friday morning.

Copyright 2023 WCSC. All rights reserved.

The Interprofessional Education Fellowship program at MUSC is all about getting students to look beyond their own academic material. From electives like cooking classes to experiences in clinical shadowing, the fellowship program offers valuable collaboration skills.

The IPE fellowship starts with elective courses. Students take one or two electives, depending on their program. These courses span myriad areas of study, from an art appreciation class at the Gibbes Art Museum or a course on 3D printing to courses focused on student’s holistic well-being or the study of film and literature.

All residential first-year students are required to take two interprofessional courses, but those pursuing the fellowship must take electives. Kimberly Kascak, director of the IPE fellowship program, said the classes are designed around the students’ schedules so they can connect with students from other programs.

“Some students want to participate in the fellowship, but they might not be able to commit to a three-hour course or a course that meets in person on Wednesdays,” Kascak explained. “We have courses that meet online, courses that meet at night. We’ll offer 13 different interprofessional electives this spring, so there’s something that meets the needs for everyone.”

While taking courses on art, wellness, film or something else, students are spending time with other students from different colleges and professions.

After taking an elective, students observe a profession that’s outside of their own. For Carla Martinez Morant, a Ph.D. candidate for the Biomedical Sciences program in the Duncan Laboratory, that meant observing a clinical geneticist. While Martinez spends most of her time studying genetics of liver disease in a lab, the IPE fellowship allowed her to see the applications of her research firsthand. She found that the geneticist works interprofessionally every day as she treats patients with rare genetic diseases.

“She works on a team to try to find the best diagnostics and patient care,” Martinez said. “She does genetic testing to understand what her patients have, and then once she has the data of what they may have, she presents that to the team, and they work to find a solution for the patient.”

For a student like Martinez, whose work is often confined to a lab, the experience with patients and other doctors was an eye-opening change of pace. “I was always interested in learning more about how I can translate my work to patient care,” Martinez said. “This type of experience not only shows you that health care works best as a team, but it also brings different connections and mentors that can help you in the future.”

Dustin Mueller, a student in the Dental Scientist Training Program (DSTP), also known as the D.M.D./Ph.D. program, had a similar experience when he observed a radiologist as part of his fellowship. As a dental student, he’s used to looking at scans of the mouth and face, but his experience observing a radiologist helped him to see these images in a different way. “I wanted to learn more about how radiologists look at scans, whether it's X-rays or MRIs, to see what they see when they look at those and notice when something is wrong,” Mueller said. “It helped me develop a different perspective than I would have just looking at scans from a dental perspective.”

Mueller said that perspective shift is important for dentists, who usually see patients more often than doctors do. “We’d hope most people are going to the dentist once or twice a year, and so I feel personally that it's super important when we see our patients, we look for things that don’t necessarily look right,” Mueller said. “It’s not something we can diagnose, but we can refer our patients to someone else. I really feel like dentistry has a lot to offer in terms of connecting with those different groups.”

After their periods of observation, students must use the knowledge they’ve gained and put it into action by way of practicums, or externships. They can do things like work as part of a cohort, become an officer in a student organization that represents different colleges or go on a medical mission trip that includes multiple professions. Essentially, a practicum can be any experience that combines more than one medical field. Martinez, the Ph.D. candidate, serves as the president of the International Student Association chapter at MUSC, where members of her executive board come from other colleges. She said working with students from different institutions and backgrounds has prepared her to do the same thing after school.

“I think if you don't understand what everyone's doing, you will have a harder time when you are in the real world because when you go to your job after school, you have to work with people from very different backgrounds,” she said. “And the more you learn, you become a better person, a better citizen and a better health care provider.”

DSTP student Mueller competed with students from other schools in the MUSC CLARION Competition, an interactive case study that challenges small groups of students to work together to analyze a case and make recommendations. Mueller said that the experience in the CLARION Competition helped him to think outside the box when approaching complicated cases. “The competition not only allowed me the opportunity to talk to people from other colleges, but it also gives you a lot of ideas that maybe you would never have thought of,” Mueller said. “It’s a cool opportunity for you to connect with specialties outside of your home college.”

These experiences offer students opportunities to lead and take ownership of challenging projects, while at the same time enabling fellow students to learn more about the unique opportunities the practicums offer and the value they provide.

As part of the practicum, students must write a scholarly paper about their experiences. “It's not just about participating in an experience but being able to teach others about that experience,” Kascak said. “So, if they've gone on a medical mission trip, that's great, but they have to come back and educate other people on that experience to grow it and spread the word.”

Kascak said the goal of the IPE fellowship is simply to encourage interprofessional relationships among students and faculty. As head of the program, she wants to ensure that her graduates have had enriching collaborative learning experiences so that they can be better collaborators as they move into their futures in health care and research. “We're really trying to show students how each one of their fields is important and a piece of the puzzle to for a piece of patient satisfaction and patient safety.”

MUSC launches Well-Being Collective, a comprehensive resource for employees on everything from wellness to efficiency to resilience.