Last year, in the middle of a historic heat wave, I visited an elementary school that I represent in South Los Angeles. Visits like this are one of the best parts of my job — it’s an opportunity to get to know students, teachers, and administrators, and to see the great things that happen every day in Los Angeles Unified School District. I finished around noon, and as I left, the school seemed oddly quiet. Looking around, I saw that students had all abandoned the play yard to sit under the shade of a few trees on the edge of the campus.
The mercury that day was above 90, which meant the temperature coming off the asphalt that covers the school was probably over 140 degrees. It’s not uncommon in the dog days of summer to see students huddled up against our buildings seeking precious inches of shade, or sheltering inside as the weather begins to overpower air conditioning systems. But this wasn’t summer at all; we were in the middle of the hottest October on record. It’s possible that every October now will be the hottest October on record.