Wake County students quickly took to Twitter to scold Wake County after they announced the decision to make three days of Spring Break into weather make-up days on Saturday March 7.
Four days prior to this announcement, Wake County tweeted, “Spring Break is safe! Make-up days for all will be Good Friday, a Sat in Apr + a Sar in May. Sat dates will be announced soon.” However, on Saturday March 7, Wake County issued a press release stating, “But [this] effort, [to use Saturdays and Good Friday] revealed numerous conflicts that severely compromised the goal of quality classroom time.”
It is not the student’s fault school was canceled because the snow. It is unfair to take away the only vacation until summer. Last school year, days were added to the end of the year in hopes that those days wouldn’t cause conflict with sports or vacation plans.
Wake County understands that using Spring Break for make-up days will affect roughly 100,000 of the 150,000 students in the system. Parents are now faced with the decision to allow their student to miss three days of school work or change vacation plans only two weeks prior.
Anne Bowers, sophomore, said, “After many arguments and tears, my parents finally agreed to let me go to the beach with my friends for Spring Break. I’ve been counting down the days ever since and now I may not be able to go again.”
A petition was created by a Wake County student to “bring back Spring Break.” As of March 10, there are roughly 8,000 signatures. Despite their effort, on March 9, Wake County announced that spring break days will remain make-up days. However, all students absent on Spring Break will receive the following school week to make up all missed work.
To reduce the need for make-up days, Wake County should create a snow day plan. Other counties use alternate bus stops outside of neighborhoods to prevent buses from traveling on unplowed roads. After a snowy winter last year and another one this year, hopefully Wake County will create a plan to reduce the number of make-up days needed.
