Don’t let the pandemic kill the snow day

This week’s snowstorm, which dropped a foot or more of snow on Connecticut, proved once again there’s nothing simple about holding school during a pandemic. The COVID-19-driven switch to remote learning this year, either full time or part time, should have opened new options for schools in winter. What had once been a tough call on whether to close schools should be made a bit easier by the fact that teachers and students are by now accustomed to learning from home, and keeping people off stilldangerous roads should be a more viable choice.

As cases in Norwalk and elsewhere this week proved, it’s not that easy a call.

Sometimes there’s no question about closing schools, as was the case Monday. As the heart of the storm hit Connecticut and Gov. Ned Lamont closed certain highways to trucks, it was inconceivable that anyone would be asked to stand at bus stops or brave back roads around the state. Tuesday and Wednesday were tougher calls, as the snow had by then mostly stopped, but many roads were frozen and paths remained treacherous.

That should be an opening for remote learning on those days. A high percentage of schools are in a hybrid schedule anyway, so why not just tell everyone to stay home and fire up their laptops to get in a day’s work?

That option, though, doesn’t account for power failures. Outages were scattered during this week’s storm, but that still means hundreds of families in communities around the state were stuck in the dark and the cold. Forget about getting to school, even remote learning was out of reach for these unlucky residents. And in Norwalk, specifically, there were complaints that Tuesday should not have been a remote learning day because there were too many students who were unable to participate thanks to power failures.

The power company said outages from this storm were sporadic, but that’s no solace to those sitting in the dark and losing a day of school. Had they been more widespread, it becomes a tougher call, and already school districts have been declaring cancellations rather than remote-learning days on the possibility that many people would be unable to plug in.

There’s an entirely new debate about snow days thanks to the pandemic. Some argue that a snowstorm should mean a day off, just like it always did. That’s what most students would likely support, though it’s not so easy on the parents — not that anything else in the past year is, either.

Still, it seems uncontroversial to say it’d be better to hold a school day in June when everyone has heat and power than in February when those can’t be assured. It’s understandable that schools don’t want to go overboard on snow days, and no one likes extending the school year too far into the summer, but we’re nowhere near that point yet.

When it’s a questionable decision, best to stick with what has worked up until now. Go ahead and declare a snow day. Unless district leaders are sure everyone in town can get online, just cancel school for the day.

Some argue that a snowstorm should mean a day off, just like it always did. That’s what most students would likely support, though it’s not so easy on the parents.