One of many schools sitting empty due to cold temperatures.
Credit: Patrick St. John | ©P. St. John
Are Parents and Schools Sending the Wrong Message to Students?
The below-normal temperatures in several areas of the country have affected nearly everyone. But those of us who live in cold-weather climates make adjustments. We go on with our daily lives. After all, we're used to it. It's winter, and we've been through several of them before.When it comes to attending school, however, it's another matter. Many schools have canceled classes due to the cold. Strange. Extremely cold days have been around as long as I can remember, and everyone went to school regardless. I did, and so did my children.
Naturally, no responsible parent would want his or her child subjected to sub-freezing temperatures for any length of time, and I certainly understand why. I never allowed my children to wait outside for a bus in frigid cold either. But a few years ago, parents used a number of options, such as driving them to the bus stop and letting them wait in the car, driving them to school, or having their sitter or a neighbor handle the transportation. If none of those options were available, then, and only then, would I consider letting them stay home.
It's no longer up to the parents, and many of them seem quite content. "In over eight years as a superintendent, I have never had to close a district due to cold temperatures," said one school official from a metropolitan Detroit district. Yes, there have been plenty of equally cold days during those eight years. Some even colder. So why close them now? Pressure from parents.
Local districts that kept their schools open on one of the cold days were flooded with angry e-mails from parents complaining that it was too cold for their children to attend school. Many of those districts closed the following day, and the reason seems obvious. Rather than deal with the pressure and potential issues, they just canceled classes.
It's sad. School officials have more important concerns, such as providing a quality education.
Comments
dfv
(Guest)
(Guest)
03/26/2009
at my school we wear uniforms, really thin dosent proide warmth and i half to walk to school in it! Cant write for the first block or so!
ananomous
(Guest)
(Guest)
01/15/2009
Kids should not go to school because some have to walk and they will freeze, while we teacher get there in car we have no problem
Karen
(Guest)
(Guest)
01/14/2009
As a teacher, I think that there are two issues that SHOULD be considered: the safety of the children and the safety of the employees. Sometimes superintendents don't take into consideration what the staff and faculty have to face when bad weather hits. Cold can be dangerous for all, but probably most of all the children waiting for the buses.
Momma C
(Guest)
(Guest)
01/14/2009
For one thing, it is the STAFF being unable to arrive in a safe and timely fashion! Teachers are often live 45+ minutes away in good weather. When you see dozens of cars in the ditch, you realize how stupid it was to even attempt driving. Secondly, as previously mentioned, a lot of kids WALK (up to 1.5 miles in our district) and icy sidewalks, knee deep snow drifts or temps in the single digits are dangerous.
Kelsi Jones
(Guest)
(Guest)
12/20/2008
I agree to a point but i know some kids that go to school by walking and dont have people to give them rides and need to walk everyday. it's better to close schools one day then to have sick kids missing more than one and anyway schools in michigan and other places where snow comes have a number of days set aside for weather-related closings usually at least 6, so it's not like it hurts their education.
Don't think of it as people being lazier or kids whinning about going out in the cold. Think about if you worked in a factory with no phone. Your spouse works a 40 minute drive away from the school. And your child's bus won't start to drive them home while the temperature outside -15. That's the issue facing schools in today's world. It's simply safer on the really cold days, to keep the kids inside.
Gas lines can freeze, batteries can die. On Monday it was -28 in a few suburbs of the Twin Cities. The city buses ran all night because no one wanted to leave people out in the cold. Additionally, it was too dangerous to turn the buses off at the risk that they wouldn't start again. School buses can't drive all night and certainly it was cold enough to cause problems with some. I used to have to walk to school and when I was seven years old, a snow storm hit. My mother was at a doctor's appointment with my other sister and since this was before the age of cell phones, I had no way to contact her. I wasn't allowed on the bus but I had to leave school. So two friends and I, all in 1st grade, walked the near mile back to our homes, alone in a snow storm. While I imagine not all schools operate in this horrendously foolish way, the danger remains. Not enough functionally buses leaves stranded children who may or may not be able to even reach their parents. Don't think of it as people being
the school is safe and reliable in such cold temperatures or snowy conditions. In generations past, if school buses encountered problems caused by the weather, more than enough parents were at home, able to drive the children or pick them up. Now however, school administrators have a different issue to look at. It's not so much about getting them to school as getting them home from school. If even one bus is affected by the frigid temperatures, that's a bus of children that can't get home, to their sitter's house, to their daycare facility, etc. They're stuck at school and that becomes a huge problem in terms of safety for those children. Many places that don't experience the severely cold temperatures we do here aren't prepared for the results of sub-zero weather and the danger of stranding children, whether it's in the morning or afternoon is too great a risk. Buses can have the same problems as cars and if you've ever started one when it's -10, you know they're not happy about it.
I completely understand your point and as someone who grew up in the cold of Minnesota, I see many school closings as pointless. We rarely got snow or cold days because as a state we're almost always prepared for them. I think the landscape of home life is really why this change occured. The reasons we didn't have school were always based around whether it would be safe to operate a vehicle in the weather. Would cars and buses start? Could they get through the snow safely? Would a trip from home to school put a student in a heightened state of risk versus a normal day? Etc... Undoubtedly, the majority of children today come from homes where both parents work or, alternatively, only one parent lives in their home and they also are a working adult. The options for getting a child to and from school are limited for these families and many depend on the school bus system. The issue isn't kids being cold outside or the building not being adequate, it's whether the transportation to and from
I mostly agree with you but one problem in my kids' elementary school is that kids come in not dressed for the weather- i.e. no coats in winter, no hats or mittens. When there are enough of those kids in a school system, the system needs to take their safety into account. Great article though. Excess school closings is definitely a pet peeve around here.
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