Schools closed or opening late due to ice

[ZappyDays]

I don’t remember this being a thing when I was at school. School closures due to snow, yes, but ice, never. Correct me if I’m wrong!

Neither do I. Our young people have been incredibly resilient over the past few years.

My Dc is in the emergency services and if they cant get to work they have to go to the nearest building, to try and start a shift, pp clearly think that nurses etc walk through blizzards just to get to work!

MThe daughters’ school gets shut for I’ve. It’s a listed building on the top of a hill with straps and ramps all over the place.

MThe daughters’ school gets shut for I’ve. It’s a listed building on the top of a hill with straps and ramps all over the place.

When I was a kid, the council gritted everywhere. I live in the next town over now but still the same council and they barely grit. Just the main roads in the biggest towns. It’s much harder to get to work in icy conditions now.

I inherited the house l grew up in. I’m 62. This side road has never been gritted. Snowiest city in England too!

l live in a really hilly city. Council decided to cut back on fruiting about 10 years ago. Broken bones at A and E rocketed. They had to reinstate it.

I also think the differences in women in the workforce are something to do with this. When my mum was in school in the 50s, she walked to school in all weathers, because she had a stay at home parent who frankly had time to walk her the hour to school in blowing snow.

When I was a child in the 80s, snow days were much more a thing. My mum couldn’t have walked me to school because she needed to be at work by 8am and she had to attempt to get there in all weathers. I was lumped with grandparents.

Now I can only get mine to school because I’m not currently working. Normally, we’d all be expected to be logged into Teams ready to work at 9am, not wandering around on a 3 mile walk to school. I think the expectation of how realistic it is to get children to school has changed because both parents often have other responsibilities.

Oh my god I don’t get what happened there! It gets shut for ice at my daughters’ school.

I think it's the dual impact of pupils and staff living further from schools, and staff numbers being cut (both in the school itself and in gritting services).

The primary school two of mine go to is in our street. When my now-adult kids went the janitor lived in a house on site. So hed clear snow and grit early doors. Then the plough/gritter lorry would come round about 7.30ish

The gritter arrives now between 7.30 and 8, but the school caretaker can't get in until it's been. Plus he's the caretaker for two other schools as well.

As a kid I used to love sitting listening to the radio when the "Schools closed in the X area are..." and then holding my breath as they went from the school alphabetically before mine and praying they didn't then say the one alphabetically after 😂

Our village school in the 80s closed quite a few times that I remember. The buses were often stopped as well

It’s much easier for those nurses to get to work if the roads aren’t clogged up by cars that are trying to get kids to school, getting stuck, crashing, etc.

It’s also easier for emergency vehicles to get to where they are needed. I recall my paramedic BIL being unable to get to a woman who was in labour in a car stuck on the M8 because there was so much stationary traffic due to snow.

I live in a snowy northern New England state and our school calendar has 5 snow days per year built into it automatically. Yes our roads are ploughed and gritted, and yes most of us have snow tyres, but if there’s a significant amount of snow its still better for everyone to keep the teachers and support staff and students off the roads. And we still end up with dozens of crashes and slide offs all over the place even with schools and many workplaces closed.

When I was at school the pavements were cleared and gritted, our council don’t do that anymore due to cost cutting. When I was child I remember the whole neighbourhood would go outside and clear the path in front of their house so the whole street was cleared pretty quickly, people don’t do that anymore either.

I’m surprised no one has mentioned the liability schools would face if they opened and someone injured themselves on the premises. Im not sure what it was like decades ago but I know now at my school if someone fell and hurt themselves and we had let them go outside near the ice there would be absolute hell to pay!

I’m in my late thirties, our school closed several times due to dangerous roads. If the council couldn’t guarantee the buses could do the morning and afternoon drops the school couldn’t open. Funnily enough students couldn’t walk miles along the A607 to get to school.

I used to work in a massive school. 1800 kids and 300 staff.

Trailng snow in and changing lesson every hour. Soon turned the corridors into floods like rivers. Everyone sent home. Too dangerous.

Bright sparks on here suggesting they change shoes at the door or check they wipe their feet. With 2100 people with one doormat.

That's also definitely a thing.

When I was in P7 I remember being infant monitor and deciding after the third bumped head on the ground on the ice slide it was time to make it a "wet playtime" and bring them inside.

Can you imagine that now?
I was also, as head monitor, the one who decided when falls/injuries were serious enough that an adult was to be fetched.

Yes, let's get everyone onto icy roads and footpaths and see what happens 🙄. FFS.

Fewer roads are gritted now, we have more cars, school staff don't live close to school. They did shut occasionally in my day (1980's).

💯 this is what happens in my school. I am often in for 6am on the days like this.

A huge amount of work goes into making the decision for delayed starts and closures. We have to give staff extra time to get in safely, lunch staff need to be in, we can't over load teaching staff with extra kids if we are 10 teachers down. I can guarantee I am out in the car park gritting, pushing cars etc on these days.

I grew up in the country where we were 8 miles from school and relied on buses. Often transport cancels.

Did I hear “resilience”? Give her a pay rise!!!!!

Not once in my school career did I have a day off because of snow. We carried on as usual.

A couple of years ago Indrove theb30 miles to work and 200 yards from the school Inspun and crashed. As I managed to manoeuvre my car to the school, I had a call to say sorry but we just decided to close the school. The air was blue. I was livid. The call should have been made earlier. Luckily no other car was around so just scrapped by tyre and wheel arch. Now I refuse to leave unless I know it is safe.

I was at school in the 70s and my school definitely had snow days.
... but also it's less about kids being soft and more that society (teachers living a long way from the school they teach in) and rules about safe opening (requirements to have a certain number of staff on site) have changed.

Definitely a thing before mobile phones. Have memories of my mum popping the radio on for a list of school closures 😁