When I grew up

[conuly]

NYC didn't cancel school for anything. Godzilla could be roaming the streets, and schools would still be open. Sure, sometimes students stayed home anyway - but we got a lot more snow then than we do now anyway, so whatever.

With that in mind, I take a rather jaundiced look at closing schools for a predicted 5 - 8 inches of snow. Even if we had gotten a full 8 inches of snow, which we didn't, a delayed opening would've been more than sufficient. What about kids who only eat three full meals every day because schools are open? What about little kids whose parents still need to work? This is a hardship on their families, and utterly unnecessary.

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Comments

[thekumquat]

Do they have minimum staff ratios in NYC? When I was at school, it meant 100 of us doing some activity with one or two staff who had made it in, but now nurseries and schools may have to close because if they can't guarantee enough staff to be open legally, they can't be open.

Staff often come from further afield than the kids so may be unable to travel when the kids just walk. This was dinned into me after the time I took half an hour to get Quatlet to nursery (a 10-min walk, normally) in the snow, suddenly feared nursery might not be open, and got there to find the manager with three kids which meant she couldn't take him as well. Luckily another staff member showed up by the time she'd explained, and the four toddlers and two adults had a great day.

Similarly, schools have to close if they think too many staff will be on strike to open the school.

[sarahthecoat]

that would be my guess too. In the olden days when we were little, the teachers could more afford to live in the towns/neighborhoods where they worked, or at least close, one or two towns away. That is much less the case now, especially in more expensive cities and towns. It can be a major issue in the suburbs as well.
I grew up in New England, where we have the equipment,but we still had snow days, especially if the snow was anticipated during the morning commute. It's just a lot easier/safer for the plows to do their job if the roads aren't full of cars, not all of which know how to handle the roads. Again, way more people don't live in places where they grew up, and way more people can't afford to have a second set of winter tires for their cars. There are just way more people (and cars) than there were 50 years ago, too, and that also increases the risk of tangling with an idiot. I have been in weather related accidents, and the takeaway for me was, easily preventable by rescheduling (I'm not a medical, first responder, or DPW worker). Not worth my safety, my car (also more expensive now than 50years ago) or my insurance rates, to go to one day of work, or errands, or whatever.
I also heartily approve of businesses and schools closing early BEFORE the roads get bad, I remember the phase when they waited until the roads were bad and then closed early, dumping rush hour onto really bad roads. The first hour is always the worst, before the sanding trucks have made the rounds.

[conuly]

That's... a possibility. However, I still maintain that even under those conditions a delayed opening probably would've been the best bet.