This school year has proven that as the climate changes, our area will see dramatic shifts in weather patterns. Already the school year has been extended by a day due to unforeseen snow conditions, but it's no longer fair to stretch out the school year because we were just unprepared. The next school year calendar needs to have more allocated snow days to offset any potential inclement weather that threatens to delay the progress of the school year.
 

While a change like this would normally require extending out the school year, I think it would be a significantly better option to convert one or two professional days into replacement weather days. In the current 2024-2025 school year calendar, there are two professional days that are neither marking period grading days nor preparation days for the beginning of the school year. Eliminating just one of these days would offer a noticeable amount of leeway the next time multiple days of school in a row need to be canceled.
 

Students would not want their spring or winter breaks to be shortened, nor for their holidays to be taken away, but we also don't want to see the school year extended. Especially in a case like this year's, in which the added school day is a half day on a Monday, extending the calendar seems pointless when we could just prepare for inclement weather by increasing the amount of extra snow days, even if it's just by one or two.