EBENSBURG — Central Cambria students will get an extra two days of summer vacation after the school district’s board of directors voted to revise the 2025-26 academic calendar Monday in response to finding mold in the elementary school, pushing the start of the school year from next Thursday to Monday, Aug. 25.

As part of the revised calendar, the teacher in-service day originally scheduled for Nov. 10 will be moved to Aug. 21 and Nov. 10 will be a student day, according to the meeting’s agenda. The final day for students is scheduled for May 28, 2026.

Superintendent Jason Moore said the reason for the delayed start is to give teachers at Cambria Elementary School more time to prepare for the upcoming school year after many supplies and items in their classrooms had to be thrown out due to a mold infestation that was discovered in mid-July.

Time normally spent preparing curriculum will be used to help each teacher determine what items were lost and replace those items, Moore said.

According to Moore, there was severe weather — flash flooding and thunderstorms — in the area on Wednesday, July 16. District officials believe that a power surge shut the school’s ventilation system down on a humid night, which created the environment for mold to grow, he said.

When district officials showed up on the morning of July 17, the school’s key fob system wasn’t working, Moore said, adding a school police officer contacted the company that handles the district’s security systems and it was determined that the system had been affected by a power surge.

On July 21, a first grade teacher found mold on desks and chairs in a classroom and reported it to the school’s maintenance director, Moore said, noting the district called Servpro of Ebensburg to evaluate the building after additional mold spores were found.

District officials haven’t been able to access the building since then, Moore said.

Additional mold spores were found in several places within the school, including the library, which Moore said is “a total loss” after Servpro employees had to remove carpeting and all of the books from the area.

“Every book in our library is gone,” Moore said during Monday’s meeting, adding many textbooks have been saved due to their hard-cover structures.

Servpro employees created an 800-page document detailing what was thrown out and what was salvageable, Moore said.

Unfortunately, Moore said a lot of teachers’ classroom materials, supplies and sentimental belongings became a biohazard and had to be thrown out.

“You’ve got to feel for the teachers,” Moore said. “I wish I could have gone into the building and saved things myself, but unfortunately that wouldn’t have been permitted.”

Moore said the mold was identified as a common type of aspergillus penicillium, which is generally not considered dangerous, but can cause health risks for people with weakened immune systems.

“It’s what’s the most abundant in the air outside,” Moore said of the mold type. “Obviously the air outside is what got trapped inside whenever the humid air with the typical mold spores in it got trapped. Air wasn’t circulating and, unfortunately, it just attached itself to some areas.”

Central Cambria officials aren’t taking any risks when it comes to the health of its students, faculty and staff members, Moore said.

During Monday’s meeting, the school board also approved the purchase of 25 Moiswell Explorer VP250 Industrial 250 pint dehumidifiers from Home Depot at a cost of $20,824.75. Those dehumidifiers will be placed throughout each of the district’s buildings, according to the meeting’s agenda.

The district has followed every recommendation from Servpro and Keystone Environmental, Health and Safety Services, Moore said, adding employees from both companies have been working long hours seven days a week to make sure the building is ready and safe for occupancy whenever teachers return for in-service days next week.

“They have definitely underpromised and overdelivered in every aspect,” Moore said of the two companies. “We’re definitely confident in the work that they’re doing that the building will be ready.”

Jeff Kuncelman, co-owner of Servpro of Ebensburg, said his employees completed the mold remediation work Monday and are awaiting the results of the final retests to ensure Cambria Elementary is safe for occupancy.

Kuncelman said they took costs into consideration and were able to save the building’s structure and infrastructure. But the cost of saving supplies “more than outweighed” the cost of trying to save them, he said, noting, “Everything that was lost is replaceable.”

Still, many teachers are “understandably upset” that they’ve lost personal items and materials, said Cambria Elementary Principal Heather Niebauer.

“Those things are gone, but safety was our priority. We wanted to make sure that everybody had a safe place to come to work, to come to school,” Niebauer said, adding many community members have reached out through emails and inquired about ways they could help.

“I think that teachers feel a lot of things right now, but supported is what they should feel because our community really has stepped up to help,” Niebauer said.

According to Moore, the mold remediation’s cost totals about $1 million. The district is working with its insurance provider to seek reimbursement, but it remains uncertain if compensation will be granted.

“We’re still hoping the insurance company is going to do the right thing and cover it,” Moore said. “Obviously, it was an act of nature that caused the problem because there was nothing unique other than the power surge, lightning strikes. We have air conditioning and the air conditioning has been going for all summer. It’s just unfortunate that the storm and lightning strikes did a number on Cambria Elementary.”

During public comment, Ebensburg resident Rose Marie Sadosky asked the board for transparency in terms of how they’re going to cover the remediation costs if its insurance provider doesn’t foot the bill.

Business manager John Link said the district does not have the funding and would likely have to raise taxes next year.

According to Link, the district has gone more than 12 years without a tax increase. A potential tax increase next year “might just have to happen” in order to keep the lights on at each of the district’s buildings and ensure all the teachers get paid, he said.

Jessica Davis, a teacher at Cambria Elementary, asked the board how frequently the school will be retested for mold and whether teachers will be able to view the results. Moore said the district will continue to follow the recommendations provided by Servpro throughout the next year. He said testing results will be shared with teachers, but he noted the district doesn’t publicize documents with building layouts for safety purposes.

Davis concluded her comments by thanking the district’s community on behalf of the district’s teachers.

“We’re really struggling emotionally because our classrooms are extensions of ourselves and they’re like our home away from home,” Davis said. “We all just want to thank you. We’re going to have a great school year no matter what.”

Mirror Staff Writer Matt Churella is at 814-946-7520.