Wed no school or 2hr delay?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I live on a busy street near NIH that gets plowed early and often. It also happens to have an elementary school. At noon today almost nothing else in the area was plowed - not reasonably big "side" streets, not the parking lots of many shops and supermarkets. By 7pm when we had to go out for a medical issue, there was a bit more plowing done, but for the most part it's still a tundra. And this is close-in, not rural MoCo.

The sidewalk issue is real. Today there was little traffic and people were walking on major streets (Connecticut Avenue!) because the sidewalks are totally blocked. Even where neighbors did their part, the snowplows dumped a lot of snow onto sidewalks.

We shovelled 5 times on Sunday. Still when we got up this morning at 8am there was a frozen coating a few inches deep that broke one of our shovels. It got easier during the day but I can't clear the packed down snow on the sidewalk without a pickaxe. (I did see for the first time in more than 20 yrs a tiny sidewalk snowplow yesterday, courtesy of MoCo apparently, but it came early in the day and the final few inches aren't budging.)

I'm from New England and the first to complain about MCPS weather phobia and closures. But I don't see any possibility that schools open on Wednesday. Maybe Thurs/Fri with a 2hr delay? And supposedly there's more snow coming on the weekend!

We were out there a lot to and were using a pickaxe and other things and still struggled.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I live on a busy street near NIH that gets plowed early and often. It also happens to have an elementary school. At noon today almost nothing else in the area was plowed - not reasonably big "side" streets, not the parking lots of many shops and supermarkets. By 7pm when we had to go out for a medical issue, there was a bit more plowing done, but for the most part it's still a tundra. And this is close-in, not rural MoCo.

The sidewalk issue is real. Today there was little traffic and people were walking on major streets (Connecticut Avenue!) because the sidewalks are totally blocked. Even where neighbors did their part, the snowplows dumped a lot of snow onto sidewalks.

We shovelled 5 times on Sunday. Still when we got up this morning at 8am there was a frozen coating a few inches deep that broke one of our shovels. It got easier during the day but I can't clear the packed down snow on the sidewalk without a pickaxe. (I did see for the first time in more than 20 yrs a tiny sidewalk snowplow yesterday, courtesy of MoCo apparently, but it came early in the day and the final few inches aren't budging.)

I'm from New England and the first to complain about MCPS weather phobia and closures. But I don't see any possibility that schools open on Wednesday. Maybe Thurs/Fri with a 2hr delay? And supposedly there's more snow coming on the weekend!

If you're actually from New England, then you absolutely walked on unshoveled sidewalks as a kid. You know that isn't a reason to close schools for days on end.

I am from New England and I remember the Blizzard of 78! I never lived close enough to walk to school but the norm there is that everyone spends all winter commuting to school/work in boots and parkas. Including adults btw - I worked for about a decade in Boston. And every HS dropout with a pickup truck makes a fortune plowing in the winter. It's just different here - there are very plows, no one owns commuter boots and most winters you don't really need them! Personally, I wish that was not the case but I'm old enough to stop fighting reality

Which is why it's a little crazy to insist that school must return to normal in 24 hours with tons of neighborhoods still fully snowed in.

Most kids didn't walk to school in boots even if they had them. They walked on the tracks already packed down.

Kids in MoCo aren't as delicate as posters here seem to think.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think no school all week.

The snow, sleet and ice are like concrete in these freezing temperatures. You need a tool to break up the ice, maybe a hoe or metal shovel. It is back breaking work. No way we open on Wednesday and likely not at all this week.

+1 digging out will take a while.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One severely overlooked issue is that when we open up and still have snowy conditions, most schools are not equipped to handle how quickly the interior lobbies and hallways become dangerous. Last winter when we had those 2 hour delays because of the icy conditions, we had 3 kids and a staff member go home after slipping and suffering head injuries walking into the school. Short of having everyone remove their shoes and walk around school in their barefeet there isn't much you can do after the few door mats become saturated with ice and water.

lol. The excuses get wilder and wilder.

Let's close for rain, too!

Seriously - c'mon. The rest of the world can handle snow, but the DMV is not able to.....as a kid I would still go to school if there was snow, back in the old country....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Bus stops have piles in front of them. The sleet has made it really hard to move. It’s just getting colder and harder as the week goes

Again, how do you think the rest of the country deals with this? It isn't the problem you think it is.

The rest of the country does not have below zero wind chills creating hypothermia and frost bite

Yes, many places do. Are you serious?

The ignorance from these posters is staggering. I thought Montgomery County was supposed to have educated residents.

The above was a pretty stupid post. I have relatives that live in New Hampshire and Vermont where big snow falls are a regular occurrence. They don’t cancel school because a kid might feel cold waiting for a school bus.

And the rest of us are trying to tell you reality. It’s not about what should happen or who does it better. Having sent kids to MCPS schools for 7+ years, I am telling you they will be closed Wednesday, possibly Thursday , maybe even Friday. I’m not saying they should be. But they will be. That is all. You can come up with all the reasons they should open but until you become superintendent, you’re just talking out of your a$$. So get mad if you want but it won’t change anything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cold weather isn’t a reason not to hold school. If you feel it is we should cancel quite a bit of summer vacation so we can start school in early August like they do in the Deep South and you can add a dozen snow/weather days to the calendar.

+1. And then your special snowflake child won’t have to set foot in the ice and cold and can hibernate like a bear in the wintertime.

Then offer our kids bus service as 2 miles in the cold, ice, snow is a bit much.

There is no kid in MCPS who is required to walk to school 2 miles without bus service. Are you posting from another state?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Bus stops have piles in front of them. The sleet has made it really hard to move. It’s just getting colder and harder as the week goes

Again, how do you think the rest of the country deals with this? It isn't the problem you think it is.

The rest of the country does not have below zero wind chills creating hypothermia and frost bite

Yes, many places do. Are you serious?

The ignorance from these posters is staggering. I thought Montgomery County was supposed to have educated residents.

The above was a pretty stupid post. I have relatives that live in New Hampshire and Vermont where big snow falls are a regular occurrence. They don’t cancel school because a kid might feel cold waiting for a school bus.

And the rest of us are trying to tell you reality. It’s not about what should happen or who does it better. Having sent kids to MCPS schools for 7+ years, I am telling you they will be closed Wednesday, possibly Thursday , maybe even Friday. I’m not saying they should be. But they will be. That is all. You can come up with all the reasons they should open but until you become superintendent, you’re just talking out of your a$$. So get mad if you want but it won’t change anything.

You are confused and bringing in lots of emotions into what is MCPS’s failure to plan for weather events. If MCPS wants to refuse to hold school if there is ice on a single county road and because a child may feel chilly in weather below 30 degrees, that is their right. But they need to extend the school year to add days in August or June to do so because if those criteria are followed, our kids will miss weeks of school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Bus stops have piles in front of them. The sleet has made it really hard to move. It’s just getting colder and harder as the week goes

Again, how do you think the rest of the country deals with this? It isn't the problem you think it is.

The rest of the country does not have below zero wind chills creating hypothermia and frost bite

Yes, many places do. Are you serious?

The ignorance from these posters is staggering. I thought Montgomery County was supposed to have educated residents.

The above was a pretty stupid post. I have relatives that live in New Hampshire and Vermont where big snow falls are a regular occurrence. They don’t cancel school because a kid might feel cold waiting for a school bus.

And the rest of us are trying to tell you reality. It’s not about what should happen or who does it better. Having sent kids to MCPS schools for 7+ years, I am telling you they will be closed Wednesday, possibly Thursday , maybe even Friday. I’m not saying they should be. But they will be. That is all. You can come up with all the reasons they should open but until you become superintendent, you’re just talking out of your a$$. So get mad if you want but it won’t change anything.

Even if you think that, why would you accept such poor decision making?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cold weather isn’t a reason not to hold school. If you feel it is we should cancel quite a bit of summer vacation so we can start school in early August like they do in the Deep South and you can add a dozen snow/weather days to the calendar.

+1. And then your special snowflake child won’t have to set foot in the ice and cold and can hibernate like a bear in the wintertime.

Then offer our kids bus service as 2 miles in the cold, ice, snow is a bit much.

There is no kid in MCPS who is required to walk to school 2 miles without bus service. Are you posting from another state?

The MCPS high school walk zone is 2 miles.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cold weather isn’t a reason not to hold school. If you feel it is we should cancel quite a bit of summer vacation so we can start school in early August like they do in the Deep South and you can add a dozen snow/weather days to the calendar.

+1. And then your special snowflake child won’t have to set foot in the ice and cold and can hibernate like a bear in the wintertime.

Then offer our kids bus service as 2 miles in the cold, ice, snow is a bit much.

There is no kid in MCPS who is required to walk to school 2 miles without bus service. Are you posting from another state?

The MCPS high school walk zone is 2 miles.

More concerning: for ES kids, it's 1 mile.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I live on a busy street near NIH that gets plowed early and often. It also happens to have an elementary school. At noon today almost nothing else in the area was plowed - not reasonably big "side" streets, not the parking lots of many shops and supermarkets. By 7pm when we had to go out for a medical issue, there was a bit more plowing done, but for the most part it's still a tundra. And this is close-in, not rural MoCo.

The sidewalk issue is real. Today there was little traffic and people were walking on major streets (Connecticut Avenue!) because the sidewalks are totally blocked. Even where neighbors did their part, the snowplows dumped a lot of snow onto sidewalks.

We shovelled 5 times on Sunday. Still when we got up this morning at 8am there was a frozen coating a few inches deep that broke one of our shovels. It got easier during the day but I can't clear the packed down snow on the sidewalk without a pickaxe. (I did see for the first time in more than 20 yrs a tiny sidewalk snowplow yesterday, courtesy of MoCo apparently, but it came early in the day and the final few inches aren't budging.)

I'm from New England and the first to complain about MCPS weather phobia and closures. But I don't see any possibility that schools open on Wednesday. Maybe Thurs/Fri with a 2hr delay? And supposedly there's more snow coming on the weekend!

We were out there a lot to and were using a pickaxe and other things and still struggled.

We shoveled three times on Sunday. Today we broke two of our three shovels working but were able to chip away at the ice and clear our sidewalks using a metal garden shovel. If sidewalks aren't clear, I wouldn't assume it's from lack of effort - I saw many of our neighbors working hard but progress isn't easy. The roads are also not getting cleared as quickly as they usually do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cold weather isn’t a reason not to hold school. If you feel it is we should cancel quite a bit of summer vacation so we can start school in early August like they do in the Deep South and you can add a dozen snow/weather days to the calendar.

+1. And then your special snowflake child won’t have to set foot in the ice and cold and can hibernate like a bear in the wintertime.

Then offer our kids bus service as 2 miles in the cold, ice, snow is a bit much.

There is no kid in MCPS who is required to walk to school 2 miles without bus service. Are you posting from another state?

The MCPS high school walk zone is 2 miles.

UP TO 2 miles, with no major highways or highly trafficked roads to cross, and only for high school students (not Ms or ES). So let’s not pretend that every kid is walking 2 miles on the regular. It’s not the case at all.

[Anonymous]

Teachers are going to be pissed when they advocate for all these closures and the natural result is that the school year starts a week earlier to accommodate all these snow days.

[Anonymous]

It got 4 pencils so 75% closed

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cold weather isn’t a reason not to hold school. If you feel it is we should cancel quite a bit of summer vacation so we can start school in early August like they do in the Deep South and you can add a dozen snow/weather days to the calendar.

+1. And then your special snowflake child won’t have to set foot in the ice and cold and can hibernate like a bear in the wintertime.

Then offer our kids bus service as 2 miles in the cold, ice, snow is a bit much.

There is no kid in MCPS who is required to walk to school 2 miles without bus service. Are you posting from another state?

No, in MCPS its a two mile rule for HS. We don't get bus service.