Will New Version Of Snow Days Make Districts Wimpier?

I don't know about you, but when I was in school, we walked uphill, both ways, in the snow. And if the snow got deeper and the air colder and kept the buses from running, we strapped cables onto our backs and dragged the buses to school ourselves. And school was never, ever canceled, because we were not wimps. Grrr.

Last Friday, the Board of Directors here at the Institute had a snow day. Well, not really a snow day. A Flexible Instruction Day. We were alerted by messages from the school and from each boy's First Grade teacher, letting us know to get out the big envelopes with FID materials for Day One and complete them, because this would count as our children's attendance for the day. 

If you haven't been through this, here's what's going on. At the beginning of the year, each teacher sent home a big envelope with a few sets of pre-created materials. The district's whole program is prepared well ahead of time and subject to approval by the state. Also, during that day teachers were available via text or whatever other avenue they had set up. 

This is obviously a remnant of pandemic closure procedures, and for precisely that reason not all districts are doing it. 

A district right next door also has a FID plan in place-- materials collected and created, approved by the state, all put in place over a year ago. But when the teachers union proposed some language about these days in the last contract, the board said, "No, we're never doing that." Knowing the general cultural and political bent of the district, I would bet that what they had in mind is that they would never fall for a made-up fake anti-liberty pandemic ever again.

So while my kids were home with their FID materials, that district was operating normally.

And if you are bemoaning the death of Snow Days, I will note that the twins finished their pack of materials in about ten minutes, leaving them with plenty of snow days.

One other important note. The inclement weather conditions never appeared. And honestly, the indicators were not all that awful ahead of time. If my district had to consider the costs of making up the day later, I'm not sure they would have pulled the plug, because it wasn't all that bad, nor were there strong signs that it was going to be. 

So I'm wondering if this new-found flexibility that allows a district to cancel school basically for free--I'm wondering if this is just going to make districts wimpier.

I sympathize with the issue. I am involved in activities that require me to make a weather-related call that affects a bunch of other people and it's stressy and fraught and often involves a decision that will absolutely be wrong no matter what you decide. But I don't think this was that. And while there may well have been some more rigorous blizzard buckets in higher grades, the twins absolutely had a day off almost indistinguishable from any other day off. Their school year is now shorter by one day. I guess as the winter rolls on we'll see if this is a trend or a blip.