When does your district announce school cancellations/delays?

[ett]

Our school district generally calls early in the morning. Our superintendent is known for almost never cancelling or delaying school. If it's a major storm that is definitely coming, then we do get the call the night before. There have been numerous days when we are one of the few towns in our area with school in session, so we generally get out earlier in June than other towns.

[AngB]

We have a new'ish superintendent and he typically calls it the night before. There was one time last year with unexpected early morning frozen rain that they made the call at about 5:30 am but more often they decide on the forecast. A couple years ago there was a bad ice storm right before school release time and many buildings in our area were forced to keep kids over night, a few buses had accidents, etc.--it was a huge nightmare but luckily no kids were injured or anything--since that, they are pretty careful about calling off on forecasts. (Although now they do more early release for something like that, or a late start if it's something that happens overnight but can get cleaned up/will melt in a couple hours.)

[dogmom]

Around 5-6 am area. They need to call three towns DPW to decide how the roads are doing and the police. We live in New England so we “budget” 5 snow days. If the happen the kids get out last week in June. Once you hit 8+ snow days things start getting dicey and you need to eliminate school vacation days to get done before the contact ends 6/30.

The try to utilize the delays when it’s just a matter of ugly morning commute conditions that the plows just need to catch up with. It was 2 degrees Tuesday, no delay or cancellation.

Night before happens with blizzards and possible state emergencies. Because the weather can turn at the last minute and you get a lot less or the timing shifts then seldom do so. It’s never the amount of snow, but the timing and rate of snow fall that determines school cancellation.

The worst is the home phone rings, then my cell, then DH cell with the notifications. So I’m glad it’s not 4 am!

[IansMom]

The day before and there have been quite a few times when there was no bad weather that should have caused the delay. We have had “snow days” with no precipitation. I am in Alabama.

[o_mom]

Between 5 and 6 am. They used to do it a little later (6-6:30 am), but had complaints that for parents who need to drop off for before school care at 7 am, it was not early enough.

Rarely do they call the night before since they have been burned too many times with the predicted "massive storm" that turns out to be a dusting.

When we suspect a delay or cancellation, I turn off alarms for the kids and the phone ringer. DH is getting up for work regardless, so we check the messages then and get them up if needed.

[georgiegirl]

We finally got the call at 5:20. All metro districts closed. Lots of businesses too. The rural districts called for a 2 hour delay last night then switched to cancelled this morning.

[wendibird22]

Around 5-6 am area. They need to call three towns DPW to decide how the roads are doing and the police. We live in New England so we “budget” 5 snow days. If the happen the kids get out last week in June. Once you hit 8+ snow days things start getting dicey and you need to eliminate school vacation days to get done before the contact ends 6/30.

The try to utilize the delays when it’s just a matter of ugly morning commute conditions that the plows just need to catch up with. It was 2 degrees Tuesday, no delay or cancellation.

Night before happens with blizzards and possible state emergencies. Because the weather can turn at the last minute and you get a lot less or the timing shifts then seldom do so. It’s never the amount of snow, but the timing and rate of snow fall that determines school cancellation.

The worst is the home phone rings, then my cell, then DH cell with the notifications. So I’m glad it’s not 4 am!

Same here. They usually get a 5am briefing from DPW and County Emergency Manager. In the great snowy NE, they don't want to needlessly waste snow days and if the wind shifts even the slightest, the next town over can get dumped and we will be fine. So it's a "I'll believe it when I see it" stance.

[Peaches Keane]

In my old district, they had a team of people who would drive around on the streets at 4:30 am. If the roads were bad, they would delay or cancel. If the roads were traversible, then school was on. So, not until 5:00 am-ish.

Unless a major storm had happened and was ongoing.

[candaceb]

The call came at 5:30 this morning. I forgot to have DH turn off his phone after double-checking to make sure my ringer was off!
They only call it the night before if it is a huge storm and they are clearly not going to be able to get the roads cleaned up in time.

[Dayzy]

Maybe once a year we get the night before call, but it's only when the forecast is a definite thing. Most times we get the 5:30 am call. It's not up to the district here though. Busing is run by an outside company and they are the ones who make the call.