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For years, students have excitedly awaited to find out their school was closed due to a snow day, but it seems this won’t be the case in Pennsylvania any longer.
Over the summer, Gov. Tom Wolf signed Senate Bill 440 into law, calling for schools to provide “flexible instruction days,” otherwise known as “cyber snow days,” during inclement weather, according toWolf’s website.
Thebill statesthat public, private, and parochial schools that apply for the program will have the option to use up to five instruction days per year and must cover lessons in English, math, science, and social studies for grades 9-12, and English and math for kindergarten through grade 8.
Districts that apply for the program have to provide accommodations for students without internet access at home or without “an insufficient amount of technology for the number of children in the household,” according to the bill.
“It’s pretty cool,” Michael Viglone, a third-grade student at Dallas Area Elementary School in Dallas, Pennsylvania — one of nearly 90 schools in the state to reportedly implement the program this year — toldFox News. “Now we get to do school from home.”
Snowy weather.Getty
“I feel like we are divided,” Kristen O’Malley, a senior at Dallas Area High School, explained to the outlet. “But I don’t think it’ll be much different, because we are all staying at home anyway since we can’t go anywhere ’cause of the snow.”
High school senior Andrew Molitoris argued, “We still kind of have the day off,” and went on to note, “It’s almost like just an extra assignment for our classes that we can do at home.”
And one Pennsylvania mother told local CBS affiliateKYW, “As opposed to kids staying home, watching television, I’m all for that.”
The legislation recently came into law after districts had to close down for inclement weather and snowstorms, according to Fox News. Pennsylvania followed several other states that had already implemented similar programs, including Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Jersey, South Carolina, and Wisconsin, the outlet reported.
In particular, Dallas Schools Superintendent Dr. Thomas Duffy told Fox News that his district averaged between 8 to 10 snow days each year — all of which were made up during the summer after the seniors had officially graduated.
Snowy weather.Getty Images
“Our thinking is, under the right circumstances, the flexible instruction days will allow for continuity and a logical progression from what was happening in the classroom the day prior,” Duffy explained, adding that summer make-up days, which extended into late June, often had low attendance.
State Sen. Kristin Phillips-Hill, who sponsored the bill, added to Fox News: “I really think it’s important to give school districts tools to meet the educational needs of their students and allow them flexibility and not a heavy-handed mandate coming down from state government.”
Schools across Pennsylvania have already adopted similar models for these cyber snow days, with students in grades 3-12 using Google Classroom to do their assignments, while kindergarteners through second-graders will receive a folder with their work to take home the day before, Fox News reported.
Teachers aren’t off the hook either. Those who give the assignments must also make themselves available to students via email or online for the duration of the “cyber snow day.”
In addition to inclement weather, Pennsylvania’s new law states that the “flexible instruction days” can be used for when there’s a disease epidemic, law enforcement emergency, inoperability of school buses, damage to the building, or any other temporary circumstances that would make the school building unsafe for students.
“The reality is all schools are embracing some form of learning platform online,” Duffy told Fox News about the new virtual assignments.
source: people.com
