By Nikhil Krishnamoorthi, Staff Writer
For the past month, public schools in Howard County have been closing due to excessive snow occurring in the county, which will lead to extra days at the end of the year. Many students and teachers are affected by this occurrence. Some enjoyed their time off and used it as an opportunity to relax, but some people were unhappy about it due to it conflicting with their academic curriculum and the amount of the things teachers and students must cover before school ends in June.
Some students saw the days off as a luxury and an opportunity not to attend class. Freshman, Sahib Batra shared his perspective on the days off that helped him catch up with his schoolwork. Because of the snow days, he had the time to settle and finish all the work he had missed during the weeks he was absent. He says, “I was in India for 2 weeks and I had to finish up two weeks’ worth of homework.” He also says, “Because of the snow days I’ve had the time to rest up and take my time to finish all the work I had from all my classes.” However, some teachers are finding these snow days very unhelpful. Mrs. Hazard, head coach of the girls cross country team said, “ I feel as though having one week off of snow days was awesome, however, this has been going on for a while, and it’s very hard to catch up with material as we are heading to the end of the year in a couple of months.”
Additionally, some teachers who teach college-level courses are having a really hard time finishing up material before AP exams and final exams. Mr. Parrish, an AP Government teacher, said how “this was probably one of the worst times that snow days are affecting my teaching and unfortunately cramming material has been my only option because I need to finish teaching all lessons by mid-April to prepare my students for the AP exam.” It’s true, many teachers who are teaching college-level courses are having the hardest time and they are feeling very stressed out because of the snow days covering up their teaching times.
Hopefully, the snow days will start to slow down and students will return to going to school five days a week to comprehend and study material before the school year ends. Mrs. Weinburg, a math teacher in River Hill, said, “I’m kind of stressed out with all the snow days that I have to push my schedule which gets really frustrating as the snow days are really unexpected.” Keep an eye out for the sky and hopefully, it is full of sunshine instead of more snow days. The teachers and students need to get back to rhythm before the year ends.