Flurries fall on clothes and trees glisten in the light. The first snow of the year is looked forward to by many.
However, with one simple decision, what may have been an enjoyable day quickly turned into fear for some staff and students of Frederick County Public Schools (FCPS)
On December 2, FCPS cancelled school and Central Office opened two hours late. This was due to snow in areas like Thurmont and Catoctin, where more southern areas saw barely any.
However, on December 5, when the southern cities got the brunt of the snow, FCPS Central Office made the decision not to delay or cancel school in response to snow on the radar.
An Instagram post made by NBC Washington December 4, at 6:46 p.m. shows that the severity of the snow was predicted, offering entities time to make a decision.
“On Friday morning, snow will move into the area between 2 a.m and 6 a.m,” NBC Washington said.
The infographic posted showed there was a chance of snow in Frederick and encouraged people to work from home or use public transportation in order to stay off the roads.
FCPS released a statement at 11:41 a.m. through Find Out First, saying “at the time [before sunrise] a decision needed to be made, all routes were deemed safe and passable.”
However, many staff and students shared that their neighborhoods had not been plowed, and many of the roads they travel to school were still covered in snow with no salt in sight. This combination lead to unsafe conditions that threatened students’ lives as they made their commute.
“My car is 4 wheel drive and I skidded and I almost hit construction cones and a construction truck on the opposite side of the road” Linganore High School (LHS) senior Carly Moyer said. “I skidded into all the roads because the roads were not treated next to my house.”
Numerous other students shared similar experiences, including brakes failing, sliding down hills, swerving into other lanes uncontrollably and near-crashes.
According to the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention, motor vehicle accidents are the leading cause of death in the United States for teenagers. In these weather conditions, students are unfamiliar with the proper driving procedures.
“I think they forget this is a lot of kids’ first time driving in snow,” Moyer said. “To drive on snow when they have not treated the roads, it’s super icy, and very cold outside, so the roads are frozen; it’s just completely not safe.”
Even with the idea that students could simply ride the bus, staff were still having trouble making it to school, including bus drivers.
“As I got to Old Annapolis Road [the road LHS resides on], the roads were covered,” LHS history teacher Janvier Beaver said. “My brakes didn’t work twice, so I slid.”
Not only were inexperienced drivers struggling with their journeys, but also adults who have been driving for 20+ years and adults transporting dozens of kids.
Beaver also shared that the FCPS Bus Status Information website crashed due to the mass amount of bus delays and the website traffic.
The bus delays were caused by a variety of issues, including road closures, accidents that created traffic backups on bus routes and dangerous conditions as a whole.
Windsor Knolls Middle School student Sophia Tiger said, “We [Sophia’s bus driver and her peers on the bus] tried to go up a hill and started sliding backwards. She [the bus driver] couldn’t get a grip on the road, so she had to turn the bus sideways.”
The FCPS bus in question ended up taking students back home.
This is not the only case of unavoidable absences in FCPS. Kemptown Elementary School had to send their students home due to a low number of staff making it to work, according to Beaver.
The hazardous weather conditions also contributed to students being late to school or being kept home by parents and guardians.
“A majority of my students did not show up on time because most of them drive to school, so we had to start [class] 15 to 20 minutes late,” Beaver said. “[When they got to class,] most of them were pretty distracted by their experiences on the road.”
Many may see today as FCPS failing. From fender-benders to rollovers, Frederick County was riddled with accidents all through the morning due to the weather.
Linganore senior and Career and Technology Center (CTC) student Kaelyn Bass shared that on her drive to CTC, she saw a group of kids pushing a car out of a ditch.
CTC is directly next to Frederick Community College (FCC), who unlike FCPS, saw a delay this morning. These educational entities see the same route, yet had very different responses to the inclement weather.
At nearby Oakdale High School, some students’ routes include traveling Interstate 70. Schools like Frederick High School and Governor Thomas Johnson High School require driving through stop-and-go traffic downtown. For many attending, Linganore High School, getting to school each morning requires driving many windy, rural roads.
The Find Out First communication issued to FCPS families and employees emphasized extended travel times and late arrivals, while many community members corroborate that the big picture of today’s events was the endangerment of lives.
Many hope that next time a situation like today arises, FCPS will respond appropriately to the threat it could place on both their students and staff. FCPS did not provide further comment other than the Find Out First statement.
In the meantime, students drivers and others can learn how to drive in snow safely here.
