The Snow Day Call, A No-Win Situation

In politics there is an old joke that most politicians will run for any office … except the local school board.

Likewise in Pennsylvania there is one job in education that you never want during the winter months — school superintendent.

On many mornings, lately, it feels like every morning, there is an early wake-up, scan of the weather report and a decision to delay or cancel school because of snow, ice, sleet or extreme cold.

There are also potential early dismissal calls to be made if a storm’s projected arrival speeds up with the chance to impact students’ trips back home.

No matter what call a school superintendent makes he or she will make some segment of the population angry. On the next two-hour delay or snow day, just check the social media comments and you’ll see what I mean. Most commenters have looked at the plowed road in front of their house and assume it is clear everywhere.

Adding to the ire of a snow day call — apparently most parents were way tougher than today’s kids. We’re armed with vivid memories of waiting outside half an hour for the school bus that picked us up three miles from our house on days when the wind chill was 40 below. Keep in mind that was for the lucky few kids who rode a bus to school. The rest walked five miles each way. Of course, those of us who did ride the bus remember no heat on the school buses.

Once we got to school at recess time we were still forced outside to play for an hour regardless of the weather.

Maybe we were tougher, but the truth is that the mind plays tricks with your memory. We remember things in an exaggerated state — the slide at the playground where we grew up looks a lot smaller now than it did then. The hill you used to bike up with your friends wasn’t really a big hill at all. Even your parents start to shrink.

But these “facts” remains in our minds: the snow was higher, the temperatures were lower and we never had snow days. Recalling childhood memories in an aggrandized version — both the good and the bad — is human nature.

No matter how tough our exaggerated memories may have made us, we are in a different world now. The school superintendent’s job during this time of year is a thankless one. If the superintendent calls a snow day and the weather doesn’t materialize as predicted by the meteorologists they’re snowed under an avalanche of criticism.

We all gripe about those days, but we should consider the alternatives. The downside of not calling for a delay or snow day is putting children at risk. The school administration is always playing defense and always has to be right. One mistake could have tragic consequences.

We can never know how many accidents have been avoided because our children were not sent to school in questionable weather. The superintendent makes these calls with the safety of thousands of children in mind. That is and should always be the only factor that matters.

So the next snow day when you see the comments on Facebook or Twitter ripping the School Superintendent complete with a grand re-telling of how tough it was in the old days — take that with a grain of salt — preferably road salt that you can use to melt the ice.

Sure the change of schedule is disruptive, sure it forces parents to adjust and change their plans. But at the start of the day when our children get onto that morning school bus they are the responsibility of the school system headed by the superintendent.

The next time you want to tee off on the person making that call look at your children — whether you have one or two or more. Think how the responsibility you have for your own children weighs on your mind when you go to bed at night.

Now imagine the immense weight it must be to consider the safety of 9,000 children when you wake up in the wee small hours on a winter’s morning and have to make the call. The enormity of that responsibility cannot be over-stated.

Although the administration will never make everyone happy, they’ll never go wrong erring on the side of caution. A disruption or inconvenience may be a problem in the short term, but consider the alternative if a big mistake is made. Be thankful the people running the schools take the safety of your children as seriously as you do.

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