LETTER School delays should be made up
I agree with your Jan. 12 editorial, “School Delays A Decision Based On Safety.”
The process that school administrators follow to delay or close school due to the weather is often arduous and double-edged. However, one needs to take it a step further and view the issue in a broader sense. Rather than canceling classes for the entire day, over the years school districts have utilized and sometimes abused the two-hour delay option as a means of skirting the 180-day state education mandate. These lost hours are not made up. It is common knowledge that school districts would prefer to implement a delay rather than close for the entire day.
During a temperature-related delay, there is only a very small difference in temperatures between 7 a.m. and 9 a.m. To be fair, many times road conditions do improve within that time frame. Everyone realizes that two-hour delays can present both a financial hardship and inconvenience to parents. Many parents may be forced to call off work and lose an entire day’s pay, or at least not be paid for the lost time. Household schedules are disrupted. All the while, teachers can remain at home for those two hours and are paid for their missed time.
With each delay, students continue to miss instruction. The missed hours add up quickly. A few years ago, due to weather-related delays, many local school districts missed the equivalent of more than an entire week of school instruction.
Schools are in the business of educating students for the success and growth of our society. We are performing a disservice to both our students and society by cheating them out of those missed hours in the classroom. The compressed schedule that schools implement during a delay is not a fair or appropriate substitute for a full day of instruction.
I call on the Pennsylvania Department of Education and the Legislature to act responsibly, and mandate that all school delays be made up. That way, students will be assured of receiving the full, 180-day education-mandate that they are entitled to, and which taxpayers have fully funded.
The formula is quite simple. When the delays add up to an entire day, either that make-up day is fulfilled in place of a vacation day or it is added to the end of the school year. This solution will not solve the issues with parents missing work, but at least we will be assured of fulfilling the state-mandated full 180 days of education for the benefit of our students and society.
Marc Simon
Washington