How does a Minnesota school district decide to call a snow day? It's not an exact science, superintendent says

CATHY WURZER: By one count, nearly 40 school districts in Minnesota have canceled school or gone to e-learning today and more could join them as we get more information about this wallop of a storm. Weather is a science, but calling a snow day? Well, that might be more of an art. You're kind of darned if you do and darned if you don't.

Kent Pekel knows that from experience. He's a superintendent of Rochester Public Schools, which, by the way, is closed today. He's with us right now. Welcome, Mr. Superintendent. Welcome back.

KENT PEKEL: Thank you. Yeah. It's great to be back here.

CATHY WURZER: All right. So walk us through the process. I think, knowing you, you're up pretty early probably looking at weather radar and the weather forecast and that kind of thing. What do you do?

KENT PEKEL: We have a great transportation coordinator, a guy named Jeff Kappers. He's been doing it for years, and he and I talked between 4:00 and 4:30. And we look at the National Weather Service in La Crosse, and we actually call and actually talk to them as well. And we try and make sure we've made the call by 5:00.

Yesterday, we made it in the evening because it seemed pretty clear that today was very unlikely to change. One time earlier this year, however, I tried to get way ahead of it to give people more advance notice, and then it was sunshiny and nothing really happened.

And so I actually went out and made sort of a tongue in cheek video pretending it was the worst snowmageddon ever, and it actually kind of went viral with like 85,000 views or something. And so I think it's just indicative the fact that people in the end understand that it's a judgment call. And sometimes, you get it right, and sometimes, you get it wrong.

CATHY WURZER: You're looking at, obviously, road conditions and ice and that kind of thing, too. Does what other districts do impact what you do in southeastern Minnesota?

KENT PEKEL: I have to say we're all human, so yes. Does the superintendent in Austin start texting me? Yes, absolutely. And Owatonna and Northfield, and then the smaller districts around us, of course, are closer, but they're quite different. Rochester is actually about 220 square miles, and so we have very urban routes, but we also have some roots that are genuinely rural, and the whole system is interconnected.

And so we can't quite base it on exactly how anybody else is seeing the storm, but we certainly do look at those things. And there really are two criteria. One is visibility, and then the second is road conditions. And then it's always a question as to what's going to happen to those as the day goes on, and that's kind of where the judgment call comes in.

CATHY WURZER: I understand that students sometimes try to sway your decision. You posted on your Twitter account some of the funny emails you've gotten.

KENT PEKEL: I have. I got one of my favorite yesterday from a student at Century High School Farhad, and he is in AP Shakespeare. And so he wrote me the request. It's sort of in the Shakespearean language. "I desire thou art staying warm in these harsh, piercing conditions of the atmosphere. As thee knowth, the weather is frail tomorrow.

In our AP Lit class, we art reading Hamlet by the great Shakespeare. Please, kind sir, for our sake, can they calleth off school during the present day to know if it'd be true. For I shall bring my belongings home if the prophecy rings true. With great pleasure, kind sir, Farhad."

So Farhad got what he wanted, but it wasn't because of his Shakespeare. It was because of the weather. But yeah, I've gotten-- it's kind of become a little thing here in Rochester. And we just have such great students, and they're so creative.

And some fifth graders wrote me some in their handwritten version yesterday too that were just as heartfelt. And sometimes, they have to do with their dog needing to spend time with them during the day or just worried about their teachers being stressed, and so it's kind of a fun thing that has become a little bit of a tradition in the year and a half that I've been here.

CATHY WURZER: On the flip side of those very sweet and heartfelt notes, you probably get some harsher communication from maybe those who are older adults, perhaps, who are not happy with your decision?

KENT PEKEL: First of all, it is tough. It's a day lost of learning. We do not right now in Rochester do e-learning on snow days. We could talk about that. But I think, actually, snow days kind of bring out the best in us and sometimes the worst in us. I will say there's an administrative assistant who sits outside my office. And sometimes, when I hear what people who don't like my snow days decision call and say to her, I think she didn't make the call, and life's too short to get that upset about anything.

On the flip side, we have a new middle school out on the far reaches of town on the top of a hill. And the first day we had a snow day this year, just candidly, we didn't know how hard it was going to be for people to get up that hill. And I will tell you the whole staff went out there, and they pushed the cars up.

And it was just incredible what happened. And from that point on, we have sanded and salted that hill every night. But the first snowstorm, we just saw that school community literally rise up and help everybody up that hill.

CATHY WURZER: So I'm a little surprised that you don't do e-learning yet. What's going on?

KENT PEKEL: We spent a lot of time with our Rochester Education Association, our Teachers Union, talking about that during our negotiations. Snow days are a negotiated thing not just with them, but with some of our other bargaining units, because you just have to be clear who has to work, who gets paid. And we didn't do it for two reasons.

One, when you're really doing high quality teaching and learning, it's a progression. And so whether you're teaching place value or topic sentences or the War of 1812, your Wednesday goes into your Thursday goes into your Friday. And to ask a teacher to adapt that on the drop of a drop of a hat because you don't see snow days coming a week in advance is really, really tough.

And then there's a logistical reason, too. Our middle and high school students take their Chromebooks or their iPads home every night, but our elementary students in general do not. So again, you need to be able to look ahead, and we know a lot of our students don't have those devices unless they take their school device home.

So for us right now, it's an old fashioned snow day. But we know a lot of districts are doing the e-learning, and we're going to be in dialogue with them and trying to really watch what that experience is like. We know during the pandemic that we all had to do it. And right now, we've made the decision to hold back on that. But we're obviously going to keep thinking about it in the years ahead.

CATHY WURZER: OK. Well, thank you for letting us see a little bit behind the curtain here, Superintendent. We appreciate it.

KENT PEKEL: Yeah. Thanks for the interest. It's obviously-- I don't know if it's art or science, but I would hope people just remember we're all trying to make the best decision we can on short notice with limited information. And you get some right, and sometimes you get them wrong.

CATHY WURZER: All right. Thank you. And take care, by the way, in the snow.

KENT PEKEL: Thank you very much.

CATHY WURZER: Kent Pekel is Superintendent of Rochester Public Schools.