Niagara County Central School District Superintendent Closes School For Thursday and Friday due to Weather

Niagara County CSD's Superintendent James Derrylson Closes School for both Thursday and Friday this past week due to unbearably cold temperatures and an extremely cold windchill!

On Wednesday January 3,2017 the wind chills were becoming more frigid. The Superintendent of the Niagara County Central School District was closely watching the wind chill advisory from the morning until later that day. The District Manager Jessy Bunnell decided that Wednesday was very cold, but Thursday was even colder. The District Decided to Close School for students.

"Due to record breaking wind chills expected tomorrow, we are going to be closing school. I have been reading many sites and have watched the wind chill advisory and it says that if students were to stand out at their bus stop, within minutes, frostbite would have consumed any exposed skin. Due to this claim, we called home and wrote a message on our website, stating that school is closed for everybody." Said Derrylson Wednesday Jan. 3 during an interview with newsbyjessy reporter Frank Fusco.

"Our District is devoted to keeping our students safe. This winter is going to be one of the harshest ones since the blizzard of 1977. Frostbite is scary for me, because I have witnessed my father's fingers and toes being amputated as a child. I felt like no family should have to go through that. I had to decide quick, so I decided to close the school."

After we interviewed Mr. James B. Derrylson, the district manager made a statement about the district's allocated snow days and what it means for students during the rest of the year.

"School Districts in all of New York are allocated a specific number of school days which are used in the event of extremely cold weather. The Districts come together and build one set of allocated snow days. How this works is the districts are categorized by size,area,average snow fall(in the area), and how many people live in very bad areas (for snow fall). Each district then decides how many extra days should be left over for the snow days. In our case, we were allocated 7 extra snow days, and 3 emergency days. We have used 2/7 days and we hope not to have to use them. In the instance we do run out of snow days, school will not be extended over the summer. The district WILL tack on extra planning days. What this will do is it won't make students stay for a few days in the summer, but will allow faculty/staff/administration to have planning days."

The district manager also says that if it happens to occur and most schools in the area close, they technically keep a snow day. We will keep you posted as more details of snow days and how they work become available.

Frank Fusco- Writer/Reporter
Newsbyjessy