Just a few snow-related thoughts that have been bouncing around in my head:
There's been a lot of discussion lately by school district administrators and others about alternatives to making up "snow days," from excusing the days entirely to cyber-schooling to calculating hours instead of days, all in the interest of preventing school from extending too far into June. As a taxpaying citizen, I hereby call BS on the whole enterprise. I believe in public education, and I believe it's my duty to support it financially. I also believe it's the duty of teachers and administrators to educate our children and prepare them for the future, even if that entails making up every school day that was lost to bad weather. Their priority is supposed to be education, not whether they'll miss out on non refundable vacation trips or their summer will be too short.
Recently on WGAL-TV, Hempfield School District Superintendent Dr. Brenda Becker said, in effect, that it's pointless to try to teach students in June, because they're not engaged. Is that the real reason, or is it because teachers just don't want to teach in June, for the reasons listed above? Why blame students? Plus, who is at fault if they're not engaged? And if the push for year-round school ever comes around again, that comment just might come back to haunt the good doctor.
Teachers are compensated handsomely, and deservedly so, and must therefore fulfill their obligations to students and taxpayers instead of trying to sidestep them. I hear a lot of talk about alternatives, but little or nothing about staying the course and completing the days.
The banner headline on Friday's Intell/New Era was "Another Nor'easter?" The article stated that local meteorologist Eric Horst said that, based on computer models, there's a one in four chance of another major storm for the middle of this week. One in four? That's only a 25% chance. Is that newsworthy, especially considering the forecast was for almost a week in advance? So, there's a 75% chance we won't get a major storm, but the local paper runs a headline ostensibly portraying the opposite. Talk about sensationalism. Disingenuous at best, irresponsible at worst. I can give better odds than one in four, however. I can predict, with 50% accuracy whether we'll get another nor'easter this week, simply by saying this: Either we will or we won't.
