Sarah Rennie – LJI reporter

The New Frontiers School Board director general, Mike Helm, says he can’t remember a time when schools were closed two days in a row because of a snowstorm.

Few will forget the ice storm of 1998 and the resulting school closures, but that was different. What fell between February 13 and 16 was just snow, but there was a lot of it, and when mixed with high winds, it quickly became dangerous.

The NFSB called three snow days in the aftermath of the back-to-back storms, which means three conditional pedagogical days scheduled for March 21, April 11, and May 20 will now become regular school days.

Students at Chateauguay Valley Regional High School missed an additional day on January 27 due to plumbing equipment failure, which, Helm admits, has made for a challenging start to the term.

“There will be some juggling with teachers, but for the most part things are OK within the system for having missed this many days,” Helm says. “Our staff are working with their curriculum throughout the course of the year, and built into that curriculum is opportunity for remediation and enrichment time. They may end up having to change some of those things right now.”

There were only three conditional ped days in the school calendar, which have now been used. Helm admits that if the schools are forced to close again for weather or other circumstances, “then every day becomes more challenging from this point on.”

Helm says interruptions caused by snow or freezing rain are sometimes called in advance, as was the case on February 16 when parents were informed the night before that schools would be closed. This happens when the NFSB has reliable information guaranteeing difficult conditions in the morning.

In cases such as February 17, the NFSB waited until the morning before cancelling classes, and this was done in communication with the transport companies.

“Severe winds and blowing snow had created white ice. There were road closures on our main highways, and in some of our rural areas we would not have been able to get to the student to bring them in,” he says, noting the transporters were uncomfortable with the conditions.

Helm says that in the aftermath of the storms, maintenance workers were asked to verify the rooftops of the different buildings and to check for drifting snow against structures to ensure there were no emergency situations. The greenhouse at Howard S. Billings High School in Chateauguay collapsed, but no other damage was reported.