Chester Schools Eyeing Holiday For Makeup Classes

A nuisance-filled winter season has forced the Chester School District into a precarious position, and may be forced to make a schedule change more than a month before the snowy season ends.

Having used all four of its allotted snow days for the 2014-15 school year as of Feb. 2, the K-8 district will now weigh the need to add a day to the calendar, and it would come in February.

In a note posted on the district’s website this week, Superintendent Dr. Christina Van Woert stated,

“It is only early February and the district has already used all of our allotted four emergency closing days this school year. At our Feb. 9th Board of Education meeting, we will be proposing that Feb. 16th, President’s Day, become a regular school day for students in anticipation of additional winter weather yet to come. We wanted to notify you as soon as possible, so that you can potentially add this date to your calendar. We will notify you of a definitive change following the Board of Education meeting.”

The use of the federal holiday for classes would be a preemptive strike on future emergency closings, not to make up for an overage of allotted snow days.

The Feb. 9 meeting will be held at Black River Middle School with a scheduled start time of 7 p.m. The public is encouraged to attend.

What do you think, Chester? Should the school district use President’s Day as a school session to make up for potential closures that may come this season?

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