Denver students can check air quality while safely indoors.

As part of a unique program stemming from the Denver Department of Public Health and Environment, you can now check the air quality around 10 Denver schools.

This is the first instance of students, teachers, and faculty and staff being able to check on air pollution levels in real time on campus. Every day, you can check the monitors at various schools and online (www.DenverAQ.com) to find out what the quality of the air is. In other words, you don’t actually have to attend one of these 10 schools to find out this information.

While there are 10 schools that have implemented monitors for this new launch, over the next three years there are expected to be 40 schools in total with this technology. These monitors are especially helpful in determining when students should refrain from certain outdoor activities.

The monitors scan for Particulate Matter (PM) 2.5 – that’s the World Health Organization’s standard for extremely fine particles that are about 30 times smaller than a strand of hair. DPHE Air Quality Program Manager Michael Ogletree told CBS 4, “it’s a laser light scattering particle counter that allows you to measure in real time what the current air quality is. It also has temperature and humidity, which is useful for creating those normalizations.”

The ultimate goal is to decrease asthma. There are about 10,000 students in Denver Public Schools who deal with asthma.

This was partially paid for by a grant from the Bloomberg Philanthropies for $1 million.