1/16th of an inch closes schools?

Everybody is going to work today, except teachers, and probably a few parents that now have to watch their kids.

in most places those days are workdays for teachers or the hours are made up.

We just don't have the equipment to handle any sort of snow or ice. We don't use salt on the roads, and buying a ton of snowplows would be cost prohibitive.

Our neighborhood is in the hills. Busses can't make it in any sort of ice, and there are no sidewalks. So if the school closes for a day or five, our kids just get days off. I can telecommute - which is fortunate.

snow days, last Friday and yesterday. They were legitimate snow days. My daughter is a teacher and I would not have wanted her to drive to school either day, in addition her job is not a babysitter. I don't think what you are suggesting is fair to teachers at all.

exactly

we are not babysitters

And

we need to worry about ourselves and being in the mess as well

Flexibility in where and how we work, and flexible attitudes toward taking time off with little advance notice, would make a lot more sense than a "nonattendance" day.

I sorta like your idea but what teachers get to go out in the weather? They already get screwed in many ways.

When we lived in Detroit, where most of the kids walked to school, they never closed in the ten years I went to Detroit Public Schools. When we moved out into the country, where most of the kids rode school buses, the call on closing schools depended on if the Asst Superintendent/Bus Coordinator (small school district) was able to get out of his own driveway.

We have to have so much snow that the plows can't get to it and have it reasonably cleared before buses go out for our schools to be closed. Or the temp has to be lower than -15. (Standing temp, not wind chill.)

But your area has to have the equipment to deal with the weather.

Snow to a lesser degree.

and kc just did not have a clue or the equipment back then

the question should be are the kids safe getting to and from school.
up north that means rather deep snow.
down south, not so much

on the lighter side it does provide comic relief to watch the south come to a screaming halt over what we consider a normal day.

and we around here can not even hold a candle to those folks who live in the true snow belts off the great lakes....like buffalo...why the hell do folks live in a snow factory like buffalo....

my two grandsons are here with me today and I could not be happier on snow days! Yes, my daughter and son in law are lucky that they have built in child care, but as someone who did at home day care when my kids were growing up, I am thinking most parents have things already set up. They need child care for days off school for teachers workshops and things like that.

I grew up in the flat part around St. Louis and we NEVER had snow days! It had to close the whole city first! Now I live in the next county south west of there and we close schools for just about any amount of snow! There are some big hills and major curves around here, so no one gets upset when the schools close.

I think it is great for the kids to be able to have a surprise break from school, not to mention being able to go play in the snow! Once they become adults they don't get that so much, so they should have it now whenever possible!

Opening the schools for "some" kids would not work because how would the districts know what schools to open and how much staff to have? And yes, this sounds like equating teachers with child care workers. Both are important, but not quite the same.

Snow is the earths way of saying, hey, slow down. Take a day off to enjoy nature. Yes, most grown ups have to work, but maybe companies should take the same attitude!

We had one here for awhile who wasn't used to snow - lots of snow days. Then he was replaced by another who was used to snow - no snow days. It wasn't a big deal for the kids either way, though they did enjoy a free day to play in the snow now and then.

1. Forecasts can be wrong. You have kids come in because 1/4" is forecast, and you get 4". Suddenly you're cancelling and sending kids home mid-day. That's worse, because it takes a while to get buses in, to reorganize how to have one set of buses first send home kids from elementary, then middle, then high school. You can't just say, "Oops, it's snowing, all schools are dismissed at 11 a.m." The logistics don't work, and then you have all the food that was being prepped for lunch to deal with. You decide at 10 am to send kids home, and they start buses running at 11 and they're done at 2, 4 hours later.

2. Districts get uneven snowfall. I've lived in places where we were sent home for snow but none fell, not a single snowflake; the other side of the district got 6". Districts usually cancel all or none. I've lived in places where we got a foot of snow and 5 miles away--same district--nothing.

3. Staff don't all live in district. Some might come in from where there's more snowfall. Even businesses that are open might expect some employees to not show up or show up late. If 15% of your teachers suddenly are out, it's a zoo. If 15% of a mostly office-based business is out, meh. It's worse if it's a production line, but something still gets done.

4. Not all school districts are set up for inclement weather. In Rochester, NY, we got 120" of snow over a month my first year of residence. Few snow days, but it's Rochester, NY. Houston? We're not set up for snow. The school buses don't do snow. The cars don't do snow. 1/16" and we'd have buses in the ditch. (No, make that "we had buses in the ditch.&quot

5. Schools get snow days. It seems a shame not to use them sometimes, if it's getting late in the season and there's a risk of mishap. Think "high school" and not "elementary school". At least in Texas, high schools have hundreds of low-experience 16- and 17-year-old drivers driving irresponsibility on good days. Now pitch in ice and snow. That risk can be very high. It seems like every month I have students whose cars are crunched in the parking lot before or after school.


But you're right--it's awkward for arranging day care. Best if the cancellations happen the night before. Still, some families have problems paying for it because in some communities public school is their day care.

As for treating it like day care and having just half the kids present, I think that would be a classroom management disaster. And while some families depend on the schools for meals for their kids, it's not day care.

Perhaps if school would have been canceled, the teachers can help students who show up (don't enforce attendance), and don't teach new materiel.

1. Teachers don't just make up lessons on the fly. My wife has every single day of her school year planned out before the first student walks into her classroom in August. You can't just insert a random day here and there.

2. Teachers aren't babysitters. That's what you'd be reducing them to. Having a kid out on a snow day is no different than having a kid out sick. It's just one of those things you get to deal with as a parent.

3. If a school district cancelled bus service because it was "too dangerous" and still required teachers to drive in, it would create a legal liability for the school district. The district is acknowleding that it's too dangerous to allow some of their employees on the roadway, while still requiring others to drive in. The first time a teacher got in an accident driving to work on a "snow day", they'd sue the bejeezus out of that district.

4. But the biggest is also the simplest. Teacher contracts require teachers to spend a certain number of days in the classroom. When a snow day occurs, that day is usually made up at the end of the year, so the total number of classroom days doesn't change. If you require a teacher to come in on a snow day AND make up that day for the kids who couldn't make it in, you are now violating their union negotiated contracts by making them work more days than their contract allows. At a minimum, the change would cost the school district a LOT of money because they're going to have to pay the teachers, office staff, and other employees for another day of work. In some states (like mine) the school is reimbursed by the state according to its daily attendance numbers, so not only would they be forced to pay out an additional days pay to the teachers, but the school will collect no tax revenue to pay them with (taking no attendance means no tax dollars for that day). For most school districts, you're talking about tens of thousands of dollars a day.

It's a complicated decision on the part of the school board. We live in a hilly/mountainous community which makes it difficult if not impossible for school buses to be safe, even with a half inch of snow. In addition, many children have to wait outside for the bus and may or may not have the proper clothing to do so in poorer areas.

The way our school district handles this is by adding extra time at the end of every school day to create a "bank" of time that is then used to offset snow days.

Finally, they have to either close it for all or keep it open. School districts lose too much money for days where the school is open and students don't come.

because the purpose of schools is education, not childcare. You didn't mention where you're from, but that also matters. Less than an inch of snow can easily be enough to cancel school in some parts of the country, if they don't normally get a lot of snow and don't have the resources to handle it for that reason. Where I live even a small amount of snow makes it dangerous because of the steep hills. It snows a lot so roads get treated but even then I'm glad my district is generous with the snow days.

I get so sick of no one thinking of or about teachers

I remember one year in high school when the school was kept open and a senior ended up skidding out and crashing into the principle's parked car which in turn hit one of the vice principle's car, which in turn hit another vice principle's car. (It was a big high school and we had 2 or 3 vice principles.)

Good times.

But, he did stretch the truth.