There is nothing better than waking up and opening your curtains to reveal an all white landscape–freshly fallen snow coating the grass and trees. Your mind races with excitement and leaves you with one singular thought: is there a snow day?

The decision of whether to open school due to the weather is up to the superintendent. Usually before six a.m. an email and phone call will go out to parents notifying them of cancellations or delays. After multiple snow days, students have begun to question whether they should or should not be contacted as well due to various personal experiences.  

Alice Fielding ’22 believes that students should be notified as many have busy or working parents. 

“Students should absolutely be notified about snow days because people that have parents that work or aren’t super involved with the school don’t see the emails immediately,” Fielding said. “If the students were to be notified then it wouldn’t be an issue and students would know and not show up to school on a snow day or early when there’s a delay.” 

Many students, like Teddy Deutsch ’24, agree with Fielding and would like to be notified. Deutsch has had a few occurrences where he will get up for the day or even get to school when it was canceled or delayed, and he didn’t find out until later.

“Most of the time parents won’t tell their child quick enough or won’t find out till the day is already quite in progress,” Deutsch said. “It is really frustrating and I truly think that such a small fix of students getting emailed would save some many parents, like my mom, from feeling guilty about unnecessary getting me up.” 

For Alex Gordon ’24, growing up and being surprised by snow days has stuck with her as memorable and undoubtedly wants to keep that fun tradition around.  

“I love when my mom walks in and tells me I can keep sleeping,” Gordon said. “It’s just the best feeling when you get to stay within the warmth of your covers and go back to sleep knowing you get to enjoy the day and refresh for the next school day.” 

In addition to being satisfied with getting notified through parents, Gordon feels that if students were emailed, they wouldn’t check them.

“I don’t check my email much at all and I think many students are the same,” Gordon said. “Honestly, it seems a little pointless for another unneeded step to be put in place when it won’t have benefits.”

Nate Barrett ’24 understands both points of views, and acknowledges that there are benefits to both sides of the debate.

“It would be nice to be notified personally so that after checking your email you can immediately make plans, but I also understand the nostalgic feeling of parents notifying us,” Barett said. “In general I don’t see the harm in notifying students nonetheless as those who want to be personally contacted will see it, and those who don’t feel the need to can still have the parents spread the exciting news.”