The morning of Jan. 7 greeted Frederick County with layers of ice and a welcomed two hour delay for Frederick County Public Schools.

Frederick County is known for releasing school cancellation/delay decisions as early as 5 am, though many times word is not spread quickly enough. Many students awoke at 6 am and checked fcps.org, finding nothing about the two hour delay to come. Channel 18, however, had the news that school was delayed two hours.

Schools in Virginia often know the night before about the status of school the next day. Frederick County delays decisions in order to always be correct.

The late decisions not only deprive students of sleep, but they are a disservice to parents of students unable to drive themselves to school.

Many families have two working parents, one of whom drops off the student on the way to work. On delay days, parents are late to work, as they have to wait to drop their kids off.

If a decision is made the night before, parents can plan better around the delays or cancellations, such as arranging rides with other families. Calling a neighbor at 6 am to ask for a ride to school is not usually a great option, especially because they could have left earlier for work. Some people don’t have the luxury of a neighbor to call upon.          

It does not matter how many snow days are used, seeing as the days are built into the school year. One hundred-eighty days of school will be had, no matter what. Bus drivers often have two jobs. When a delay decision is made the night before, the drivers have adequate time with which to contact the second employer and notify them that they will be late.

The probability of using all five snow days is quite low. FCPS needs to err on the side of caution and safety, instead of always needing to be correct. The school system does not judge individual schools (except in extreme cases), they average the situations of all the schools together.

 While Middletown and Walkersville might have a half-inch of ice, if Frederick, Tuscarora, and Thomas Johnson might be completely fine, causing FCPS to either open on time or delay two hours. This can easily lead to accidents in the Middletown and Walkersville areas, proving to be a liability to the system.

There have been numerous instances in which school systems have decided to delay school instead of cancelling, and buses and cars end up in bad situations. Often, that type of situation leads to an accident, especially with black ice on the roads.

If FCPS wants to continue this practice, it will need to make a few adjustments to the system to keep everyone safe and happy, hopefully providing a better school atmosphere.