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Tim Sackton submitting comments re: the city's snow policy.
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To the Honorable Board:
I am sure you have received many comments on the cancelation of afterschool activities on Wednesday and the school closure on Thursday. I know that the decision to cancel school is a difficult one, and everyone is trying their best. However, I have to say as a parent in the district with a son at the Brown school, the closures this past week were particularly egregious, and build upon a history of questionable snow closure decisions I've seen in the three years my son has been attending the Brown school. I think the city needs to address these failures and proactively consider ways to improve our snow policy.
Specifically, in my opinion there are three issues that are paramount. First of all, I believe the city needs to reconsider allowing the use of school parking lots for resident parking during snow emergencies, or failing that have an explicit, written plan for how schools can open during a snow emergency. While several school committee members have told me that parking is not a determinative factor in canceling school, I find it quite hard to believe that it is not a significant contributing factor. Particularly, there are often days when Somerville is closed for two days during a storm when many other districts only close for one day. When snow has stopped, travel is safe, but a snow emergency is not lifted until mid-morning, it is hard not to believe that schools are closed primarily because of parking issues. I once tried to estimate how many spots are available in school lots via Google maps, and it appears it is only a few hundred. To prioritize a few hundred cars over the much larger number of families with kids in the Somerville schools is not, in my opinion, good policy. I understand from talking to my ward alderman (Lance Davis) that this is entirely up to the central administration, and so could easily be changed. I am absolutely sure that the number of parents who would welcome this change is far larger than the number of residents who would be upset, although I understand that parking is always a contentious issue.
Second, I believe that the school district needs to address the timing of cancelation calls. This of course was particularly problematic during the most recent "storm". Afterschool activities were canceled on Wednesday despite absolutely no snow falling during afterschool hours, seemingly only to accommodate the snow emergency. Despite rapidly changing forecasts during the course of Wednesday afternoon, school was canceled prematurely on Wednesday evening. While of course I believe it is always better to cancel school as early as possible, from an affected outsider it at least appears that the current policy is to always make a decision by 7 pm or so the night before. When forecasts warrant, I believe Somerville must be prepared to make a decision about school cancelation in the early morning. The inability to do this is a serious problem and will always tend to lead to unnecessary cancelations.
Finally, I think in general that more consideration needs to be made for the costs to students, parents, and families of closing school. I am particularly fortunate in that my work is flexible and I am in a position where I can usually work from home or bring my son into the office with me when school is closed. Many families in Somerville do not have that luxury. I think Somerville needs to put greater emphasis on the goal of avoiding unnecessary closures, instead of making the best decision possible with the information available at 5-6 pm the previous night. I know that no one wants to cancel school unnecessarily, but right now the Somerville snow policy appears to be too heavily weighted towards "make the best decision we can as early as possible" instead of something like "make sure we only close school when it is necessary to ensure student safety and educational objectives."
I understand this is a difficult issue to balance, but for a district that prides itself on data-driven decision making I think we can do better.
Respectfully,
Tim Sackton