How to protect US students from heat in schools – and is it time to rethink summer break?

US schools were built for a cooler climate that no longer exists. Now they face record-high temperatures

As schools are returning to session following one of the hottest summers ever recorded, districts are faced with a new problem: how to handle increasingly extreme heatwaves, both in and outside the classroom.

Unbearably hot days are no longer just a summer problem. In the US districts from the north-east to the mountain west to the deep south are shortening days, delaying openings, and reworking calendars as temperatures spike during August and September, the typical back-to-school months.