School HVAC work is unlike any other commercial segment. The buildings are older, the filter sizes are less predictable, the budgets are tied to annual approval cycles, and the occupants include children whose health outcomes are directly tied to indoor air quality. Contractors who understand these realities win long-term district relationships. Those who do not spend their time chasing one-off calls.
Brookaire, the Fair Lawn, New Jersey, commercial air filter manufacturer and distributor founded in 1974, has published a free guide for HVAC contractors and facility managers covering the specific challenges of air filtration in educational facilities and how to address them.
The guide is available at no cost and requires no registration. HVAC contractors serving school districts across Newark, New York City, Philadelphia, Boston, and surrounding areas are the primary audience, though the content applies across all states in Brookaire's service territory.
The full guide is at airfilters.brookaire.com/hvac-challenges-educational-facilities-guide.
WHAT THE GUIDE COVERS
The guide is organized around four challenges that define school HVAC work in practice.
The first is aging equipment and non-standard filter sizes. Most public K-12 buildings in Newark, Philadelphia, Boston, and across the Northeast were constructed between 1950 and 1980. The unit ventilators and air handling units inside many of them take filter sizes tied to the original equipment manufacturer, not to today's standard catalog. A contractor arriving at a school expecting a standard 20x25x4 filter opening and finding a nonstandard dimension built decades ago loses time on every visit. The guide covers how to identify these situations, how to measure correctly, and how to source non-standard sizes through Brookaire's 48-hour custom production with no minimum order.
The second is multi-building campus programs. A mid-size school district in New Jersey's Bergen or Morris County corridor runs eight to twelve buildings. A Philadelphia-area district covers dozens of sites. Managing a quarterly filter program across those buildings means coordinating deliveries, tracking which filters went to which building, and reordering on schedule without re-entering specifications each cycle. The guide covers how job tagging by school building and the customer portal's saved jobs feature address both problems.
The third is the annual budget cycle. School districts in Newark, New York City, Philadelphia, and Boston operate on fiscal years with procurement rules for spending above certain thresholds. Filter purchasing is a line item approved in advance. The guide covers two approaches that work within these constraints, including annual purchasing with staged quarterly delivery and reserve programs that release shipments against a pre-approved budget.
The fourth is the summer maintenance window. Most school districts schedule major HVAC work between June and late August. Filters arriving in the wrong week create scheduling problems that push maintenance into the school year. Brookaire's scheduled delivery, same-day options in Zone 1, and job tagging by school and unit support tight summer maintenance calendars.
THE IAQ STANDARD THAT HAS SHIFTED SINCE 2020
The U.S. Government Accountability Office found in 2020 that 41 percent of school districts need to update or replace HVAC systems in at least half their school buildings. That report predated the pandemic. The period from 2020 to 2023 changed what school boards, parents, and state regulators expect from school HVAC systems.
MERV 13 has moved from a healthcare-grade specification to the recommended minimum for school ventilation systems in current ASHRAE guidance. For contractors bidding school district maintenance contracts in Newark, New York City, Philadelphia, and Boston, MERV 13 is now the starting specification, not an upgrade.
Nearly 60 percent of schools nationwide struggle with poor air quality. Around 20 percent of the American population, more than 66 million people, are in schools every day. The air filtration decisions contractors make in these buildings have a direct effect on that population.
"School contracts are relationship-driven work," said Lynne Laake, Marketing Director at Brookaire. "A district that trusts your recommendations and appreciates your service will keep calling you back. Get a reputation as the contractor who actually understands school HVAC challenges, and referrals follow. This guide was written to help contractors build that reputation."
WHERE BROOKAIRE SERVES SCHOOL DISTRICTS
Brookaire's Fair Lawn, New Jersey headquarters serves school districts across all of New Jersey including Newark and surrounding communities in Bergen, Essex, Hudson, Mercer, Camden, and Ocean counties. The York, Pennsylvania distribution center serves districts across Philadelphia, Lancaster, York, Chester, Berks, and Allegheny counties. The Lakeville, Minnesota distribution center serves school districts across Minneapolis, Saint Paul, Rochester, Duluth, and Greater Minnesota. The Avon, Massachusetts location at 254 Bodwell St, Unit A, Avon, MA 02322 serves districts across Greater Boston, Worcester, Springfield, Connecticut, and Rhode Island.
For additional reading, Brookaire's white paper on HVAC challenges for educational facilities is available at brookaire.com/hvac-challenges-for-educational-facilities.
ABOUT BROOKAIRE
Brookaire is a third-generation, family-operated manufacturer and distributor of commercial HVAC air filters headquartered in Fair Lawn, New Jersey. Founded in 1974, the company operates distribution centers at 17-02 Nevins Road, Fair Lawn, NJ 07410; 581 Manchester Ct, York, PA 17408; 8095 215th St W, Lakeville, MN 55044; and 254 Bodwell St Unit A, Avon, MA 02322. Brookaire manufactures standard and custom pleated filters, HEPA filters, carbon pleated filters, bag and pocket filters, and the DeltaPleat premium filter line, all from 100 percent US-sourced materials. Services include scheduled job-site delivery, job tagging, real-time tracking, a customer portal for multi-site account management, 48-hour custom filter production, and filter disposal pickup.
Brookaire serves HVAC contractors and facility managers across New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Delaware, Washington DC, Minnesota, and Wisconsin.
Education HVAC guide: airfilters.brookaire.com/hvac-challenges-educational-facilities-guide
Education white paper: brookaire.com/hvac-challenges-for-educational-facilities
Resource library: airfilters.brookaire.com
All locations: brookaire.com/locations
Follow Brookaire:
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/company/brookaire-company
Instagram: instagram.com/brookaire
Facebook: facebook.com/brookaire
YouTube: youtube.com/channel/UChSapJieifNddxqEyqj1ESQ
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Media Contact:
Lynne Laake
Marketing Director, Brookaire Corporation
(973) 473-7527
Source: Brookaire Corporation
Release ID: 2646505
