School kids may be excited about all of the recent snow days — and ice days — but they’ll quiet down quickly if the principal says those days will have to be made up during Spring Break or even on Saturdays. Lyle Schwartz, superintendent at the South Hamilton Community Schools in Jewell, says they’ve had six snow days already this school year and four late starts.
Schwartz says the current plan is to make all of those days up at the end of the school year, having students conclude classes on June 2nd. We’re only one month into winter though, and school officials statewide know they may be facing many more snow days before Spring. If more school has to be called off, Schwartz says he’s considering other options, like cancelling Spring Break, though he knows that would be an unpopular move.
“We have quite a number of people, both parents with students in school and staff members, who have made plans for that time and have paid for those (vacations),” Schwartz says. “It would be a possibility but probably not a first choice.” He says he’s also looked into holding classes over the weekend to make up for all of the snow days.
“We’ve not done that but it is permissible to have school on Saturday,” Schwartz says. “I actually looked that up this morning just to make sure. It is something as we go along here that we’ll probably have some conversations about.” In addition to this week’s ice storm which knocked out power to tens of thousands of homes and businesses statewide, Iowa’s experienced three large snowstorms since December, two that were classified as full-scale blizzards.
By Pat Powers, KQWC, Webster City