The end of the marking period means students are rushing to get their work in before deadlines and meeting with teachers every day to find out how they can improve their grades. However, a series of snow days interrupted the end-of-quarter process, putting students and teachers on edge to make deadlines.
The week of Jan. 15 to Jan. 19 consisted of only one full day of school because of two back-to-back snow storms. Each day students waited by their computers and phones, refreshing the MCPS website or Instagram to see the announcement from MCPS of codes red or orange, which indicate no school. “Waiting on my phone for the message made me reminisce on the time when I would be waiting with my parents watching the news, waiting for Montgomery County Public Schools to show up at the bottom of the screen as closed or delayed. I used my days to try and get work done while also enjoying the free time,” senior Anthony Johnson said.
While students were waiting for a code red or orange, many were unaware of the code purple. This is a new policy MCPS implemented that would transition a normal school day to an online day of learning, similar to the 2020-2021 school year. This day would include synchronous instruction for four hours and attendance would be taken. Students were shocked by the policy and feared it would be implemented for the off day on Jan 19., but the decision had to be made by noon the day before, which it was not. “I heard students talk about the code purple rule but I wasn’t worried because we went through this for a whole school year so one snow day online wouldn’t be a problem,” junior Miguel Uriarte Giron said.
Students enjoyed the snow days as they were offered a chance to relax at home, but canceled school also created additional stress as MCPS was reaching the end of the semester. The second marking period ended on Jan. 29 but the four days off required teachers to push back lessons and quizzes, interrupting the workflow. “The week of Jan. 15 I was going to retake some quizzes and learn the new concepts in math from my teacher. But the closings made it harder and harder to do that, which I needed for my grade. I had to use the very last week to get everything in when I could have done that if we had school,” senior Atharva Kshirsagar said.
