Our School Cleaning Tips for The New Academic Year

MCS branches across the country are hard at work cleaning our nations’ schools and getting them ready for the new academic year, but our school cleaning efforts don’t stop once the summer holidays end. 

In order to provide a clean environment for teachers and pupils across the school year it is important to prioritise cleanliness all year-round. This includes investing in ongoing school cleaning services​ from MCS but also means washing hands, disinfecting surfaces, and incorporating the following key practices into daily school life to keep the whole building clean and germ-free.

1. Clean High-Touch Areas

Door handles, light switches, toilet locks, keyboards – schools are full of high-touch areas that are repeatedly handled throughout the day. Unlike desks and tables which only need to be cleaned twice during the day, these touchpoints should be sanitised at every available opportunity. 

The best times to do so are at the beginning of every lesson, as pupils will have come into contact with all of these areas whilst switching from one classroom to the next. Having them wiped down before the pupils move around the school again is the best way to stop germs from spreading and to prevent them from building up on these surfaces in the first place. 

2. Encourage Hand Washing

These touchpoints may trap germs but it is pupils and teachers who carry these infections on their hands and allow them to spread, so nip the cause of cross-contamination in the bud by encouraging pupils to wash their hands.

In primary schools this is easy enough to do, as each teacher can direct pupils to the bathrooms to wash their hands before leading them to the dining hall at lunchtime, but in secondary schools each student’s personal hygiene is their own responsibility. The best way to keep pupils’ hands clean is to have posters in the bathrooms that outline the steps needed to properly wash their hands and to install hand sanitiser dispensers throughout the school to make it easier for them to follow these standard hygiene practices. 

3. Sanitise Bathrooms

Classrooms and playgrounds all come with a risk of cross-contamination but nowhere is a hotspot for germs quite like school bathrooms. Every surface must be kept clean and sanitised and cleaning washrooms twice a day is standard practice for any school that aims to keep infection rates down and protect its pupils. 

At a minimum, the school bathrooms should be cleaned once in the morning before all the pupils arrive and once in the afternoon after they have all left. Of course this is not to say that the bathrooms should then be left all day – rather, they should be sanitised regularly and the soap dispensers and toilet roll holders must be restocked as needed. 

4. Empty Bins 

After hometime, all bins in classrooms, bathrooms, staff rooms, hallways, and dining rooms must be emptied and their liners replaced ahead of the new school day. Overflowing bins not only look messy and detract from the schools’ image but also pose health and safety risks, particularly during flu season, when they are likely to be full of tissues. 

The bins in bathrooms should also be bleached and sanitised regularly, and must only be emptied by an approved cleaner in line with the relevant waste management guidelines. 

5. Manage Pupil Illnesses

Schools have a responsibility to their pupils to keep them safe and to provide them with a clean learning environment. However, in some cases, the best way to protect everyone is to have sick pupils stay at home until they feel better. 

In a busy school setting, all it takes is just a few points of contact for germs to spread through an entire year group, and encouraging ill pupils to remain at home is the most effective way to control infection. Making this a clear school rule from September will reduce the number of pupils that are sent into school with instructions to ‘see how they feel by lunchtime’, and will also reduce the need to repeatedly sanitise classrooms during a spike in infections. 

2026 School Cleaning Services​ 

Taking these steps will maintain a base level of hygiene across your premises but regular cleaning services are required to keep it in the best order, so contact MCS today to arrange a regular school cleaning service that you can rely on.