-1 and School is cancelled already...

tinknal · #21 02/05/07, 07:58 AM

-24 here and school is open, and why not?

Rowenna7 · #22 02/05/07, 08:02 AM

-17F here...most of the area schools have closed.

vtfarma · #23 02/05/07, 08:19 AM

Vermonters are like Iowans. School doesn't close for the below zero temps and windchills. Its below zero this am with 15 to 30 mph winds. If they did cancel school the kids would just beg to go skiing or boarding. Yep, the woodstove is going, the animals have been fed and watered, and I am reminiscing about the day we sent our preschooler on the bus to school and the air temp was 40 below. A tad cold, we just had her bundled up so all you saw was eyes, if she fell she would have probably had to be helped up. Son wears shorts to school everyday still...14 and has just recently been forced to put on sweats for the trip in. Temp right now is 2 in the sun.

My only complaint with this weather is my Rheumatoid Arthritis is worse. It is making me feel old and look haggered but besides that the weather is not going to beat me! It might help that the entire family goes skiing and boarding on the weekends and I get some alone time to put up my feet and enjoy the fire!

Tracy in Idaho · #24 02/05/07, 08:21 AM

Our kids have gone to school most of the year at -20 to -30 F

It's simply the norm. The only exception they make is that they don't go outside for recess if it is below zero. I have to admit, I find it a bit amusing that other places actually call school simply because of the temp. It has to be a major blizzard here for school to be called.

Tracy

DaleK · #25 02/05/07, 08:26 AM

Windchill's supposed to be -35 to -40 here today, school's on. When I was in school (80-93) the teachers had a contract that said they didn't have to go out to supervise recess below -20 but the policy was the kids had to be out down to -30 so in between the teachers would stand at the window with their coffee and lock the doors so the kids couldn't come in until the end of recess. Still seems to be the way things are done.

MullersLaneFarm · #26 02/05/07, 08:28 AM

-16º (air temp) Schools have closed here.

My son's buddy called him this morning and told him about it. Said, "I know you don't watch TV in the morning and you'd be the only idiot standing outside wondering where the bus was."

Patty0315 · #27 02/05/07, 08:30 AM

Northern NY is no better. We got 2-4 feet of snow yesterday wind chills -25 . No school today because the roads are crap. We have been watching all the town trucks go by , seems one got stuck and now they have to get him out.

Patty

SeptemberWolf · #28 02/05/07, 08:49 AM

-25 easily. No schools cancelled in my area, but Duluth/Superior area has closed schools. The circulating pump for our water supply at work has frozen so no bathroom use - however the building across the street has working toilets. (Thank goodness - have had my usual 3 cups java.)

I'll be leaving here at noon to supply fresh water to my ducks and make sure my dogs haven't ordered pizza while I'm gone ..

Anniebek · #29 02/05/07, 09:01 AM

I am so sorry...I can't help myself...it is a chilly 40 degrees here today. Y'alls blood must be as thick as molasses!!

Anniebek

SeptemberWolf · #30 02/05/07, 09:05 AM

and Anniebek, you can just imagine what that thick blood does to our brains ..

Rockin'B · #31 02/05/07, 09:17 AM

-15 when I left for work this AM. All of my outside hydrants froze. Tank heater is consuming 1500 watts to open the cows tank.
Schools closed and the kids are loving life!

AnnaS · #32 02/05/07, 09:35 AM

The official low last night was -27 but the neighbors say they had -30. We're always a few degrees colder than the official. Something's up with my well pump too. No water in the house. Yesterday I went down into the well pit and got water out of the drain faucet on the pump, but this morning, nothing. The pump just runs and runs with nary a drop.

To the good, my car started on the second crank this morning. It's been sitting out in the wind without a block heater or any sort of extra. Love them Saturns.

SherrieC · #33 02/05/07, 09:45 AM

all of these schools are really close to us like the next county over north west and east, but ours only delayed. I'm driving school bus right now so I know we are already running on a 2 hr delay for tomorrow as well.
Tracy The schools close because it's normally not so cold here, and the students go out without hats to the bus, and even WALK to school, with skin freezing in less then 10 mins , and a longer than 10 min walk. one of my regular teenaged girls wears flip flops no socks and halter top no jacket to school every morning, she comes down a loooonnng drive. the first 5 stops this morning didn't get on! I thought about keeping my little buddy home as well. Student safety is 1st !

***SCHOOL CLOSINGS FOR MONDAY 2-5-07***

LaGrange County--
Lakeland

Branch County--
Coldwater
Bronson
Union City
Quincy
B.I.S.D.
St. Charles Catholic School in Coldwater
Pansophia Academy

Hillsdale County--
Litchfield
Camden-Frontier
Waldron

Williams County--
Bryan
Edon Northwest
Montpelier
Edgerton
North Central
Stryker
Mill Creek-West Unity

MELOC · #34 02/05/07, 09:55 AM

it was about 3*F just west of gettysburg this morning.

Chris in PA · #35 02/05/07, 10:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tracy in Idaho

Our kids have gone to school most of the year at -20 to -30 F

It's simply the norm. The only exception they make is that they don't go outside for recess if it is below zero. I have to admit, I find it a bit amusing that other places actually call school simply because of the temp. It has to be a major blizzard here for school to be called.

Tracy

I was born and raised in Erie PA until I was 9. Moved to SC PA. I can remember standing in front of the picture window of our new house watching it snow our first winter here. It had barely covered the grass and they were already cancelling school. All five kids and my Mom just stood there in a row wondering "WHY????"

MELOC · #36 02/05/07, 10:08 AM

sometimes we get weather that is nastier at the tops of the mountains (hills) than at the bottoms. sometimes it is a sheet of ice on the ridges and just rainy in the valley.

Wayne02 · #37 02/05/07, 10:17 AM

My sons school district has missed a bunch of days due to the brutal storms we experienced during December and January. The school districts around here are in a no-win situation when they have to make the go/no go decision each day.

Inevitably if the district calls for no school, you will see a bunch of letters to the editor in next weeks paper from angry parents who thought the conditions "were not that bad". Many of these parents are just mad because they had to find alternative daycare provisions on those days. If the district calls for school on a storm day, the next week there will be letters to the editor from angry parents who thought, "the school district has no right to put our children in danger".

I must say that I was very pleased with our districts decisions this time around. They made the call to cancel school in a fairly conservative fashion, while a couple of other districts bowed to the pressure and attempted school that day. The evening news on those days were filled with commute horror stories - school buses in ditches, very angry parents etc.

Now the districts are in the midst of a huge controversy on how to make up the missed days. There are so many missed days that the school year will go deep into summer, and the teachers and parents are not happy about this. The teachers union has some sort of rule that the teachers have to be in the classroom X number of days per year. A number of the teachers teach summer school at the local colleges and the extended school year conflicts with their summer classes.

Parents are angry because the extended school year messes up vacation plans/reservations/deposits etc. One school district made the decision to use the mid winter one-week break in February to make up some of the days. Then recently had to reverse that decision because there would not be enough teachers available (on vacation/not willing to be flexible I guess) to have school that week.

Personally, I think if the union requires teachers to be in the classroom X number of days (apparently says nothing about students) then have the teachers spend the make up days in the classroom by themselves...

pookshollow · #38 02/05/07, 10:20 AM

Quote:

I am so sorry...I can't help myself...it is a chilly 40 degrees here today

Shut up. Just . . . shut up.

I've come in from my 2nd hour of shovelling. Couldn't feel my face or my toes - checked in the mirror, no white spots, so no frostbite.

Of course, by the time I go back out, what I've just cleared will be drifted in again.

vtfarma · #39 02/05/07, 10:23 AM

Rockin'B,

Ditch the tank heater and get a "frog" pond pump. We switched to the bubbler setup 2 years ago. The pumps cost 60 or 80$ new and work for a few years - summer they are in our frog pond, winter they bubble the cows water. THe cows only had a thin crust of ice on the spray bubble one time - it had been between 20 and 30 below for 4 days straight. One of the cows touched her nose to it and it disintegrated. THey actually drink from the spray.

Beats having the meter fly when the tank heater is on.

Tracy in Idaho · #40 02/05/07, 10:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SherrieC

Tracy The schools close because it's normally not so cold here, and the students go out without hats to the bus, and even WALK to school, with skin freezing in less then 10 mins , and a longer than 10 min walk. one of my regular teenaged girls wears flip flops no socks and halter top no jacket to school every morning, she comes down a loooonnng drive.

Well, I bet they'd only make that mistake one day! We have a ton of kids who walk to school from the far side of town and oddly enough, they never seem to freeze to death.

How can a teenager wear a halter top and flip flops to school? Don't they have a dress code? Our kids are not allowed either, and are not allowed to wear shorts (knee length) from Oct to April.

Tracy