GREENSBORO, N.C. — Sanitation workers on college campuses face a tall task this semester.

With students back in classrooms, they’re responsible for cleaning high touch points such as common areas and classrooms on a daily basis.

Leaders at UNC Greensboro say their disinfectant use went up between 200-300% since last year.

“It’s been a really great community effort to keep everybody here,” says Jon Soter, the director of facilities operations at UNCG. “We’re looking forward to continuing that through the spring semester.”

Soter says the introduction of electrostatic sprayers has been vital. The tool’s sanitizer latches onto surfaces, instead of lingering in the air.

They only had eight on campus last fall, but now they have 82.

“I feel like I’m doing something that really means a lot because we’re the front people on the line,” says Karen Thompson, a detail specialist at UNCG. “So we have to make sure that we do our job right, so that everybody here is safe.”

The UNC system allocated more than $44 million to schools across the system last year, to help them buy the cleaning supplies they needed, and to support students and remote learning.