HVAC problems put school maintenance pressures in focus as students return

Cooling failures in Wake County and Houston are disrupting classrooms as districts elsewhere commit millions of dollars to repairs or confront large deferred-maintenance backlogs.
Aug. 26, 2026
4 min read
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Key Highlights

  • Seven Wake County, N.C., schools had confirmed HVAC outages as traditional-calendar students returned this week.
  • A WRAL review found documented heating or cooling maintenance concerns at more than one-third of Wake County’s roughly 200 schools; HVAC repairs represent about one-quarter of the district’s $800 million maintenance backlog.
  • Houston ISD is also contending with cooling problems at multiple campuses as students return, adding to a longer-running pattern of HVAC work orders and repairs.
  • The problems echo recent challenges in Henrico County, Va., where the district is investing $20 million in mechanical improvements, and Montgomery County, Md., where school officials say 40 HVAC systems are not functioning as they should amid a roughly $3 billion facilities backlog.
Courtesy of Heather Mcardle | Dreamstime
Thermometer hangs from classroom ceiling showing high temperature with desks in rows in the background.

For some Wake County students, the first days of the new school year have included an extra piece of classroom equipment: temporary air conditioners. Wake County Public School System confirmed HVAC outages at seven schools as students returned Monday, including Penny Road Elementary, where parents helped obtain window units for affected classrooms. The district has 13 HVAC technicians responsible for roughly 4,700 pieces of heating and cooling equipment, according to reporting from WRAL News.

Those outages may be the immediate problem, but they’re just one part of a much larger maintenance challenge facing the district. A WRAL review of school health inspections found documented HVAC concerns at more than one-third of Wake County’s roughly 200 schools. District officials say heating and cooling repairs account for about one-quarter of an estimated $800 million deferred-maintenance backlog.

North Carolina isn’t the only state with schools struggling to keep students cool, however. In Henrico County, Va., school officials spent the summer trying to get ahead of similar problems rather than waiting for them to disrupt opening day, as reported earlier by American School & University. The county’s fiscal 2026–27 capital plan directs $20 million toward school mechanical improvements, including aging HVAC equipment and chillers, while the district has added maintenance staff and is using spot coolers and high-capacity fans where permanent repairs are still underway.

Wake County is using some of those same temporary measures right now. Superintendent Robert Taylor told WRAL that maintenance crews generally begin addressing breakdowns within 24 hours, while cautioning against classrooms installing their own window units without consulting facilities staff because of potential electrical-load issues.

Aging systems create recurring operational problems

Over in Texas, Houston ISD offers yet another variation on HVAC problems facing school administrators and facilities teams. Parents at Anderson Elementary reported air-conditioning problems during the second week of classes this month, prompting some families to pick students up early, according to Click2Houston. Earlier this year, parents at Neff Elementary said some classrooms were reaching 80 to 90 degrees and that students were being moved or combined into cooler rooms. HISD acknowledged at the time that many campuses have aging HVAC systems that require frequent attention and said technicians, emergency vendors, and portable cooling equipment are used whenever problems arise.

Why it matters

HVAC problems are rarely isolated equipment failures. As school systems accumulate aging chillers, rooftop units, controls, and other mechanical equipment, maintenance staffing, capital budgets, temporary cooling, and classroom operations become much more intertwined. The experiences in Wake County, Houston, Henrico, and Montgomery County show the different points at which districts are forced to answer the same basic question: how long can aging systems be repaired before replacement becomes unavoidable?

The complaints come on the heels of a substantial volume of HVAC maintenance work at the district in recent years. The Houston Chronicle reported earlier this month that Houston ISD recorded 1,646 HVAC-related work orders in May 2025 alone, including 123 classified as emergencies and 700 as urgent. The district subsequently approved $21.2 million in additional HVAC upgrades through April 2026, targeting about 25 campuses. That investment has not eliminated the need for day-to-day repairs, however, just as Henrico’s $20 million capital commitment doesn’t mean every system has already been replaced.

In Montgomery County, Md., the problem is even bigger. As AS&U reported earlier this week, the school system is managing an estimated $3 billion facilities maintenance backlog across approximately 240 facilities. Superintendent Thomas Taylor said two-thirds of those facilities need significant renovation and that 40 HVAC systems are not operating as they should.

Montgomery County faces a variety of facility related challenges including repairs to roofs, plumbing, electrical systems, masonry, and other infrastructure in addition to HVAC, but the district’s cooling problems emphasize how deferred capital needs eventually crop up in daily operations. Taylor has cited excessive classroom temperatures and other system failures as conditions that can interrupt instruction or potentially force school closures—a reality that Wake County has already experienced. HVAC failures during extreme temperatures have caused early dismissals at dozens of schools in recent years, and roughly one-third of the district’s schools have dismissed early at least once since 2023 because of malfunctioning systems, according to WRAL.

At the same time, Wake County’s circumstances illustrate why the solution is rarely as simple as replacing every problematic unit. The district has hundreds of millions of dollars in deferred maintenance needs spread across HVAC, plumbing, roofs, and other infrastructure, while enrollment growth has slowed after years in which capital and staffing decisions were heavily influenced by the need to accommodate additional students.

That puts many facilities departments in the difficult position of trying to keep existing equipment running, deciding which systems warrant immediate capital replacement, maintaining enough skilled technicians to respond when equipment fails, and finding temporary ways to keep classrooms usable while permanent work moves forward.

With schools now back in session, those decisions aren’t limited to capital plans and maintenance schedules anymore. In Wake County and Houston, they’re playing out in occupied classrooms where students and staff are literally feeling their impacts.

Contributors:
This piece was created with the help of generative AI tools and edited by our content team for clarity and accuracy.
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