to want to know right now, whether the kids school is openor not?

[vvvodka]

check the website they say. well i did, and it just says check the website.
once child needs to be out the door in thirtyfive minutes to catch the bus, the other in an hour and a half. putting the news up on the website at nine o clock is no good to me, or anyone.
grrr...

im a bit annoyed at DS school, he goes to a private priory school for autistic children (who need certainty and routine!) they closed yesterday at 1pm but only rang us at 12.30pm to come collect, luckily transport taxi agreed to do the run BUT have been trying to contact school since 7.30am today and had no answer, taxi company getting shirty with me stating if roads trecherous they cant do run and asking if school was open! when i told taxi i didnt know if school was open and can only say roads are bad in my street as dont know about main roads they got shirty.
DS has just been picked up half hour late and school is apparently open but decision will be made at 12pm if they stay open or close early! If they close early taxi has said they wont collect which means i will have to attempt the 40 minute drive (in good weather so probably hour+) drive to collect DS.

Noone answered school phone till 8.30am.....they only have 13 pupils so i would have thought they could have rang people before half eight SURELY!

I work at a junior school & got a text from the head at about 6.30 to say we were closed. I tried to update the website (it's run by an external company, but I can update from anywhere); kept getting 'server busy' and couln't get on till 8.00.
The head contacted the local radio station, but we are still not appearing on the list they are reading out, and now the head can't get through to them.

Most of our parents are on the ParentMail system so they get texts or emails, which the school secretary can do from home, but I suspect there may be delays getting those messages through simply because of the number of schools closed. There really isn't any foolproof system - even if we tried ringing every parent at say 2 minutes per call it would take hours - and telephone 'trees' are only any good until a branch breaks....

Worzelmummage - email is a great thing when it works, think the sheer volume of people means everyting is having trouble. Also it relies on someone having the details of all the children in school to hand - fine if they can get into school but what if no one can get near school due to the snow? Same for phoning/texting parents. As mentioned in similar threads- not all schools maintain their own websites sometimes this is outsourced to companies or the local authority, or sometimes it is not possible to access it from home.

Oh, and before someone says 'why don't they take the children's details home the night before' - we're not allowed to....

We had a text about my DDs school being closed first thing this morning. We get all important news via text like that. Its a great system

We got texts from both schools too, fab system [smug emoticon]

I find this very frustrating. Our school's alert system is via BBC Essex and Heart FM. Today both the websites were out of action (BBC's because of a problem where they can't update the site and Heart's due to weight of traffic). The BBC gives out details in dribs and drabs (so I never know if my school is actually open or if I've just missed hearing it being mentioned cos I dared to visit the bathroom) and I've been unable to find Heart on my radio.

The problem is that the websites are always down on snowy days, and the lists read out on air never seem to cover our school. It takes so much longer to wrap everyone up and get them out of the house on a snowy day - and I'm wasting even more time hopping between PC and radio.

If in doubt, I pack everyone up and head off to school - if push comes to shove we just walk home again (and that's happened mor ethan once).

This time we knew by 8am. All three schools. Better than last year.

Without giving too much away, my job invovles looking after email services for a whole county's schools. On days like today the schools do generally send out emails to let parents know that they will be closed.

Unfortunately this does mean that there are suddenly an awful lot of emails going out from our mail servers to the common uk ISPs - wanadoo, btinternet, blueyonder, etc - as these are where a lot of the parents have their email addresses in a short period of time - typically between 6.30 am and 8 am on a snow day.

These companies see a lot of mail coming from us in a short space of time - and promptly block us from sending in case it's spam! We constantly battle with them to get them to recognise that we might at times lneed to do this - but still they block us everytime we need to send out snow messages!

Just had a text from my head saying the borough have insisted all heads decide on whether the school is open/closed tomorrow by 3pm.

As it hasn't yet stopped snowing (since 7pm yesterday) we are unsurprisingly closed tomorrow.

I am happy, even though I'm not entirely sure whether, as support staff, I will be paid or not.

Our school (primary) just started this year sending texts. Last year was hopeless for the reasons others have given (websites crashing and not updated etc).

I rang the lovely school secretary, to ask if they may have to close the wraparound tomorrow morning as well as closing early tonight. They are not sure currently.

She told me that the deputy and caretaker were clearing paths at 7am but the head couldn't make a final decision until 8am (to see how many staff would make it). We had a text at 8.15am. I did say to her that it made my life a bit easier as we were walking to school at that point (it is 1.5 miles away) and it was reassuring to know that it was definitely open.

I texted head at the school where I teach at 7.15, no news until 7.40, said school was open. Got DD to childminders, neither she nor I had any idea whether the school my DD and hers attend was open or not (check website at 7.30 they said, no news on there at 8.10!), made it half way to work and got a text to say my school was closed too. Good grief...

lol My DS's primary...I got through on the phone at 8.45am (I normally leave for the bus at 8.10am!) to be told it was closed and I was the first parent to find out. The Juniors starts at 8.45....No info on website, parentline text alerts hadn't been sent, couldn't get heart or radio essex on the radio and couldn't get the LEA site to work (think it combusted or something). I said to the lady in the office that it was just as well they were shut, as I wasn't going to leave the house without a definate answer, and if they could possibly let me know by 8.05 on snow days in future it would be much appreciated! Apparently the Head only decided that minute that the school was shut...FGS how hard is it to make a decision?? GRRR!!

Nom - I don't blame you. In that situation, I'd use my leave as well. £80 is a lot to cough up out of the budget with very little notice! (at least it is to me, and I'm sure quite a few others!)

Went to collect DD from school at 3:15pm - only to find that the school had closed early and all the other children had been collected at 2:30pm. How did their parents know? Cos they had a text.... I didn't - despite paying £5 for the pleasure. I got the one this morning about the playgroup - but not the important one about the school closing. The office don't seem bothered that I didn't get the text - but what about tomorrow, and the next day, and so on through this cold snap - I won't be able to relax for wondering what's happening each day.

Aggghhhhhhh.