Districts, athletic orgs postpone outdoor activities due to air quality

CAPITAL REGION, N.Y. (NEWS10) -- The poor air quality impacting the Capital Region comes at a time when there are spring sports championships and outdoor school activities on the calendar.

“This is a phenomenon that we literally didn’t see coming,” said Joseph Hochreiter, Albany City School District Superintendent.

His district, like most others in the area have rescheduled outdoor field trips and moved physical education classes and recess indoors Wednesday.

"We believe we’ll be able to resume tomorrow, but we’re going to keep a close eye on it. Certainly, our schools have field days and outside activities, but we are building contingent plans to make sure that students don’t lose out on those opportunities,“ Hochreiter said.

NYSPHSAA postponed the boys' lacrosse semifinals. Niskayuna was supposed to take on Garden City Wednesday afternoon. The team from Long Island already made the trip up to Albany.

"We’re taking all the information, and trying to make the best decision with the understanding that student safety has to be our focus," said Dr. Robert Zayas, Executive Director of NYSPHSAA.

According to NYSPHSAA, tickets will be honored for the new dates and times. When the air quality is this bad, it’s recommended people don’t exert themselves outdoors. Dr. Zayas said options are being explored to move certain games into indoor venues, if possible, but with so many on the books, it likely won’t be feasible across the board.

“We’re not going to put student athletes in a situation that they are expected to participate in strenuous activity in air quality levels like that,” Dr. Zayas explained.

Now, Niskayuna is supposed to take on Garden City in the boys' lacrosse Class B semifinals on Friday.