Montgomery County has a policy in place that says if there is a code purple then we will move to virtual learning. According to Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS), this means that if bad weather can be predicted for the next day and they decide ahead of time that there will be a school closure then we will go virtual. We would also go virtual if there was a blizzard and the county closed schools for multiple days. There also needs to be communication about virtual learning, they can’t just decide on the same day that there is going to be virtual.
If the weather predicts that it might snow the next day and MCPS doesn’t end up canceling schools til the next morning there will be no virtual learning. Remember a couple of years ago and there was a big blizzard that caused school to close for a week? That won’t happen again so instead of getting a week off, we would get a week of virtual school. I think snow days should not go virtual at all but people disagree and think that virtual snow days make sure students don’t lose valuable learning time. But I disagree, a virtual school day will not be able to replace a real school day. As shown by COVID students don’t do well with virtual school, students will most likely not pay attention to their Zoom class or might not even show up at all.
Another reason people want virtual snow days is they don’t like the idea of school days being added to the end of the year as they are concerned that it will interfere with people’s summer plans. But MCPS gets a couple of snow days built into the year so a few days off won’t affect the school schedule. Maryland has not seen a lot of snow recently so it is unlikely that we will use all the snow days, but even if we do one or two days add the the end of the year won’t make a big impact.
If there is a blizzard or snow the internet will likely be down or not work well causing students and teachers stress because they won’t be able to get on their Zoom class. If students’ internet is down then they won’t be able to attend class defeating the purpose of virtual learning. The bad weather will inevitably cause technical difficulties.
Students also deserve a break from their rigorous and demanding course load. According to an article in The Atlantic a fourth-grade teacher in Lake Tahoe, California, described that snow days are “like gifts from the heavens that we all need: a sigh, a moment.”
What students can do to get snow days back is to send an email to MCPS to persuade them to change their policy about snow days. Students can contact them through this email: [email protected]. Students deserve to have snow days and they should not be taken away.
