Back to School: Classes resume after unscheduled break

Sounds of children and teens filled the hallways and playgrounds at schools across Carroll County on Monday, Feb. 5, after an unexpected week off thanks to Mother Nature.

In fact, heading into this week, schools in Berryville and Eureka Springs were closed seven of the past eight school days because of snowy and icy roads.

Green Forest schools were also closed seven of the past eight days, but Friday, Feb. 3, was designated as a previously scheduled professional development day as teachers attended meetings on campus.

“It’s really good to have students back at school this week,” Berryville Superintendent Owen Powell said Monday morning. “We missed the whole week last week. It got really messy and icy, and the roads got really bad.”

Temperatures in the area didn’t get above freezing until Thursday and inches of sleet and ice left roads and parking lots a hazard, forcing the days of closure, said Bryan Pruitt, Eureka Springs superintendent.

“We’re glad to be back,” Pruitt said Monday morning. “Hopefully we will have a good week back here and get back and get back after it … we missed seven days and that’s a lot of instruction time. Now that we’re back, we can’t waste any minutes. We’ve got to hit the ground running and stay after it because we’ve got our spring assessments coming up in April. We’ve got a lot of ground to cover.”

Thanks to the Alternative Method of Instruction program, which started during COVID-19, the seven days the school buildings were closed will still count as school days.

“Since COVID, the state says at the beginning of the year have the opportunity to apply for 10 AMI days,” Pruitt said. “Especially the schools up in our area, this part of the state, we usually have to use our days where they might not have to do that in the River Valley on down.”

Knowing AMI days are an option helps when deciding whether schools should close because of weather, according to Green Forest Superintendent Matt Summers.

“I think it’s a little bit of a comfort blanket,” Summers said. “When we’re driving the roads at 4 a.m., looking at the weather forecast, looking at the temperature, when’s the front going to get here, all of that kind of stuff, if it’s [a] 50/50 we’re always going to take that safe bet and take the AMI day.

“Whereas when you had to make every day up back in the day, there were some days that maybe we came [to school] when that might have not been the safest or best decision. But now it does give us a little bit of a cushion, so to speak, on making those tough calls. And I think that’s a good thing.”

AMI days also help students maintain holidays such as Spring Break and help assure that school gets out for summer break as scheduled, the superintendents said.

Before the pandemic introduced schools to AMI days, which include online homework submissions and classes held via Zoom, “snow days” typically meant school districts would have to make up those missed instructional days at some point during the school year to meet the state-mandated required number of school days.

“It’s really good to have those days,” Powell said about AMI. “The purpose of that is really not to teach a lot of new material or information. It’s really more of a review day of things that have already been taught and just to keep school on our students’ minds.

“We’re fortunate that we don’t have to make these days up or extend the school year. So far, we’ve used seven of our 10 AMI days, so we have three more available, if needed, but hopefully we don’t need them. Hopefully the snow and ice is done, but you never know. February is typically a pretty cold month. But if it weren’t for AMI days there would be a really good chance of us having to extend the school year and going past Memorial Day into June. And anytime that happens it’s really not good because we plan on summer school in the month of June and also have a lot of summer maintenance that has to be done.”

Summers agreed, stressing the importance of his district being able to utilize every day in the summer when students aren’t there for special projects.

“I think the parents and kids have realized what an AMI day is, and it does count for attendance and can count for grades,” Summers said. “But yet it’s not messing with your Spring Break as of yet and not messing with the end of the school year.

“One thing people don’t recognize, the general public, is we need every day in the summer here at school for those of us that are here year-round to get our floors waxed, to get all of our supplies ordered and to get all of our new furniture purchased. Any major projects like a re-flooring in a building or a big paint project, we need all of that time in the summer, and every day counts to have to flip it all around and have it ready to go for another school year. So going long is really not a good thing for the district.”

Pruitt said he feels AMI days can also be beneficial to students in other ways.

“I’m glad that we have the opportunity for AMI days,” Pruitt said. “With our technology and our abilities to submit lessons online … we think it is not only a good opportunity for us, but it also trains our kids how it’s going to be when they go to college. Now, in college your assignments are emailed to you and are to be submitted by like midnight on Sunday or such. So, what we’re doing is getting our kids used to that and prepped for the next step.”

With Eureka Springs and Berryville down to three AMI days left this school year, and Green Forest down to four, all area superintendents are hoping winter weather doesn’t have another week-long stay on its agenda.

“I heard talk about Friday, that there’s a chance of snow flurries,” Pruitt said. “As long as it starts about 2:45 p.m., let it come.”