The ISSA Clean Standard By: Rex Morrison For K-12 Schools What the standard includes, and why it is a game changer. Rex Morrison is president of the nonprofit Process Cleaning for Healthy Schools (PC4HS) Consortium Inc., and he pio-neered PC4HS in 100 schools in Nevada. Morrison helps school districts implement the PC4HS program to save money and jobs while enhanc-ing the health of the indoor environment. Morrison is also a CIMS ISSA Certification Expert (ICE) ready to pro-vide training and consulting services to cleaning organiza-tions preparing to be certified to the Cleaning Industry Management Standard (CIMS). Image courtesy of CathyYeulet/Hemera/Thinkstock A for more info Visit www.cmmonline.com and type in search keyword: K-12 . For more information on related products, visit www.cmmonline.com , select BUYERS’ GUIDE from the main navigation bar, and enter keyword: Clean Standard . As many school boards reduce cleaning efforts in light of mounting budget cuts, the Clean Standard, due out this summer, sets a high but practical bar for cleaning in educational facilities. According to ISSA, the goal of the Clean Stan-dard is to provide schools with a useful tool that will help them objectively assess and control the level of cleanliness in their facilities. The Clean Standard establishes a “range of clean” as measured by adenosine triphosphate (ATP) bioluminescence, and is a non-prescriptive way to select processes that help schools get into the “clean and healthy” zone: Lower ATP levels — based on desired Relative Light Unit (RLU) ranges of leading devices — mean less bioload, equaling less risk of infectious organisms, in most cases. As a seminal work, the Clean Standard sci-entifically but indirectly informs the marketplace about the hazards within our schools and em-phatically tells us how to effectively reduce many infectious risks. This is done through measured cleaning, or re-moval of key soils that may compromise hygiene, rather than just poisoning microbes and accept-ing the consequences of indiscriminate disinfec-tant use. Just as the green manifesto, Silent Spring by Ra-chel Carson, changed the way we deal with pests in the outdoor environment, the Clean Standard The Clean Standard makes possible a much needed National Clean Standard, and finally defines cleaning properly as the removal of potentially harmful substances. 16 CM/Cleaning & Maintenance Management ® • July 2013
CMM – Archives July 2013: 16
