OPS’s new snow day policy is a waste of time and not worth the effort. Snow days have been a sliver of excitement for me and all other students since we started school in kindergarten. It is something to look forward to when the rest of the year is gloomy with the stress of the third quarter and the dreadful weather. Taking away snow days and turning them into remote learning days was the wrong decision on OPS’s part. 

One reason why having remote learning days during inclement weather is not worth it is because the school day is shortened. When classes are only twenty minutes long there is no time to get any new learning done, maybe only a few minutes of housekeeping and discussing upcoming plans. The whole point of having remote learning days on snow days is to not miss out on days of school, so having classes that are not even long enough to learn anything is quite contradictory.  

The fact that students as young as kindergarten and first grade will no longer get to experience snow days, a joy for most young students in the wintertime, is quite sad and discouraging. Snow days were the times when you played outside with your siblings and enjoyed simply being a kid. There was no stress of school, and it was a break from the repeated cycle. Now, OPS students will be stuck inside for pointlessly short class periods instead of getting to catch up on sleep, play in the snow, and relax, like the rest of the metro school districts.  

Especially with the added stressors of Covid-19 and the 3/2 family learning model, keeping the tradition of snow days alive for students is the least that OPS could do. My mom is a first-grade teacher for OPS and seeing the students log on reminds me of all the fun and excitement of snow days. From sitting at home after school and waiting for “Omaha Public Schools” to pop up on the news to wearing our pajamas backwards and flushing ice down the toilet, it was a memory that most students will never forget.