ashe

If Wilkes County Schools can get an exemption from the state BOE, then I would think Ashe would be able to get one too. I have heard that the state will allow up to five days for extreme events like weather if a county requests it, but Ashe doesn't do it. According to the website the school calendar for this year has students attending 1136 hours and I assume they will subtract from them each time they miss. If onlyinashe is correct that they must go 1000 hours wouldn't this mean they have 136 hours they can miss? If they don't use them I guess they can get out earlier in the school year.

Unless you have an exemption from the state BOE, as Wilkes does, 180 instructional days 1000 hours instruction time. Both requirements factor into meeting the state level requirements.

Require all kids to ride bus. End these foolish parents blocking every road to get their little bundles of love.

Need to put the High school students back under the wheel of the buses. The old geezers driving them now are in the ditches everywhere you look. It appears most have never driven in the snow. The high school students have been driving since they were 4 in most cases.

Monday morning quarterbacking on a Friday night.

It was a bad decision not to let school out early. Buses were on the roads at the worst time today. When they realized they had screwed up, at least they had the good sense to put chains on the buses that had not yet left the schools instead of rushing them out onto the roads.

are you kidding me, its been snowing in creston since 10am. This was a poor choice and the superintendent should be reprimanded. This is what you get when our county hires someone with a business degree to be in charge of our educational system here in Ashe. You can call it whining if you want, but every parent in Ashe county should be very concerned. I believe the superintendent must be somewhat of a control freak!! not sure. And to state the obvious....so much more traffic today than in the past. Not even worth arguing over!!! if you believe that children of our community were not put in unnecessary danger today, please get your IQ checked. There is a bus in the ditch as we speak, full of children!!!! would not have happened if proper precautions would have been taken. A couple of hours of school cant replace the loss of a life

I too rode the bus when high school students were the drivers. As a matter of fact, my next door neighbor drove my bus and she did an excellent job! I might be more senile than I realize but we did not travel in conditions like the roads were in today if it could be helped, and today it could have been prevented. As far as more drivers on the road today, I do believe there are as the population in Ashe has grown considerably over last 27 years and parents are more financially able to provide an automobile for their child. As I stated earlier, it is my understanding that the school calendar was purposely padded with substantial extra hours (around 100) beyond what the state requires so that the school system wouldn't run into issues with not meeting enough instructional hours. It is hours that they go by now and not days. Parents allow their children to drive to school trusting that the well paid superintendent will do their job and do the right thing, especially when there was a forecast that clearly showed what we could expect.

When I was on high school most of our parents didn't let us drive if there was a chance of snow. I'm an native as well and I remember very well being on a bus when the roads were like they were today. I remember parents praying more for the safety of their children and not whining. We went to school a lot more than we were out because a flake of snow might fall. Those parents that are whining remember when the spring break is taken away a day at a time you didn't want your kids going to school because it might snow. I heard parents complaining because the Christmas break was cut short. That was to give extra days because we don't get as many as we did years ago. The past few years we have went over those days.

We definitely went to school on MUCH worse days than this. Also, when I was in school, high school seniors were allowed to drive the bus. The buses had chains on and off we went to school. Part of the problem is that we have a lot of influence from people who are not native to this area or snow. As for student drivers, I don't know that there are more now than there were when I was in school in the 80's. The only difference is that the schools are all consolidated now which does mean the buses and student drivers have to drive further to get home or to school. I am not opposed to dismissing school a couple of hours early to avoid some of the problems they are having today and it certainly would not hurt the kids education to cut the day short. However, I do not like them calling school off just because of a forecast, which is often times wrong, and that eventually turn in to the kids having to go to school nearly 2 weeks in June.

Ashehikingmom- I don't know your age and how long ago you rode on a bus but several factors have changed. First, with one high school we no longer have the community schools where students were only driving a few miles from their home and didn't risk being on the roads for very long. Second, it appears that people are more financially able to put their children in an automobile today and we have many more student drivers than ever before. Once again, since we only have one high school, many of those student drivers' siblings get off the middle and elementary bus at the high school and ride home with their sibling. Finally, I am an Ashe native that rode the bus my entire life until my senior year of high school, and rode it then if I didn't have gas money, and I never remember riding on roads as slick as they were this afternoon if we knew snow was coming and could prevent it from happening. I agree that whining and complaining might not fix the problem, but it's not going to fix itself and it needs some attention as we knew this was the predicted forecast. Every school in the surrounding area got out early or school was cancelled based on the possibility of weather such as this. It is my understanding, that Ashe school district has extra time built into their schedule so they can avoid scenarios like this one. If I have calculated correctly, the school system has not used one minute of the extra hours that they have set aside. I think this is simply a result of poor judgement and lack of experience and parents have every right to be upset and question the decision. I hope all the children make it home safe and sound!

I can remember getting called out of class to help the bus driver and janitor put chains on the bus and helping the bus driver install the chains on the side of the road which at that time was one land gravel.

I totally agree that the chains should have been put on before they were. I can recall a few times we were loaded on the buses and then sent back to class because the roads were too bad to travel on.

I too remember going to school in bad weather and in the past few years it seems that they call school at the first sign of a snow flake. I just got a call from the BOE that kids would be home late as they were having to put chains on the buses. Why this wasn't already done instead of waiting is beyond me.

Am I the only one that remembers going to school in worse weather conditions than what we are having today? Did our parents whine and complain so much when the school system didn't let school out early when it started snowing? Yes, I have a child in the school system and yes, that child means the world to me. However, I'm not going to get my panties in a bunch because she is at school while it is snowing. I rode the bus while being driven by a high school student in worse conditions than today. Everybody needs to just get a grip!