Ali Jones’ workday has been more chaotic than usual. Her nine-year-old son hasn’t had school in a week, after teacher professional development days and the President’s Day holiday bled into cold weather cancellations at Heartland Elementary this week. The snow and chilly temperatures also kept her four-year-old home.
“It's constantly kids coming up in the middle of meetings, asking questions, needing things, wanting snacks, saying they're bored, just over and over,” Jones said. “It's just exhausting.”
Jones said she’s lucky that she can work remotely and doesn’t have to use paid time off when her children stay home. But she says it’s difficult to focus with all the interruptions.
“I love my children so, so much, but I want them to be in school,” Jones said.
Schools across the metro canceled in-person classes as a cold front swept snow and barely-above-zero temperatures into the area
Students in Kansas and Missouri already had an extended winter break last month after road conditions and cold made it too risky to return to their classrooms.
Jones said her kids have watched more TV and played more with electronics than she would normally allow. She’s encouraged her son to read to his younger sister, but says she knows they're getting bored.
Jones said she understands that freezing temperatures made it unsafe for buses to operate or for children to walk to school, but wishes there was an alternative to keeping kids at home.
“They're already behind from COVID and all that stuff, and then we just continue to miss day after day,” she said. “It makes it harder when they do go back to learn.”
Jones hopes her kids can return to school on Friday.
Schools are now running out of snow and virtual learning days, which could push back the end of the school year or require them to make up instructional hours.
Some schools build snow days into their calendars, and can hold class virtually for a limited number of hours each year. Many have run out of both.
- Kansas City Public Schools: ran out of virtual days on Tuesday. It will need to make up all snow days after that.
- Lee’s Summit School District: already pushed back the last day of school by four days, to May 30. The school district announced it would also close schools on Thursday, but will ask the Lee’s Summit Board of Education on Thursday night to “forgive” the additional instruction day so the last day of school would remain on May 30. The school district will make up any additional snow days in June.
- Blue Springs School District: Will need to make up some inclement weather days at the end of the year, and will decide the last day of school in March.
- Center School District: used its last virtual learning day Wednesday.
- Hickman Mills School Districts: used the last virtual learning day Wednesday, but has three additional days built into its school calendar that it won't have to make up. If it misses more days, the school district would turn a spring professional development day into a regular school day.
- North Kansas City Schools: used its last virtual day last week, and has used the one snow day built into its calendar. Future inclement weather days will be made up at the end of the year or on staff work days that students weren’t initially meant to attend.
- Shawnee Mission School District: used six inclement weather days and still has two available. A district spokesperson said Kansas forgives four inclement weather days after schools use four designated snow days in their calendar.
- Kansas City, Kansas Public Schools: added 10 minutes to its high school schedule in order to meet state requirements.
- Grain Valley School District: held class on President’s Day to make up snow days after using all of its permitted virtual learning days. The district surveyed families to decide on a make-up day, with 57% of nearly 2,000 parents ranking Presidents Day as their first choice. If the school district misses up to two more days of school this winter, April 18 and April 21 will serve as the next make-up days.
