School Adjusts to Multiple Snow Days

East students had a break from school Tuesday, Feb. 4 through Friday, Feb. 7, 2014. Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday were snow days issued by the district. Friday, East held parent teacher conferences, so students only attended school Monday, Feb. 3.

Winter sports teams, the theater department and Chemistry II AP students are just a few of the groups that were affected by the days off.

Senior basketball player Luke Haverty said that the snow days were relaxing, but it was necessary for the team to still get their minds prepared for practices and games.

“When you play in a league like the Sunflower League, every practice is crucial so we worked hard to make up the lost days,” Haverty said.

The team only practiced once during the week and then played Olathe North in the game that Friday.

The theater department worried that they would suffer because of missed musical rehearsals due to the weather. With “Shrek” the musical a week away, Senior Justin Amer believes the snow days actually caused the cast to work harder.

“We actually got to come in Thursday and Friday and had extended rehearsals,” Armer said. “Honestly it was probably more effective than if we had had spread out practices. We were more focused in those couple of days and I think we’re ready for show week.”

In addition to falling behind in sports and extracurriculars students participate in, missing classes caused setbacks. Mr. Appier’s Chemistry II AP students were required to come take a test Friday morning while other students were enjoying a day off.

According to senior Ali Manske, the class has a lot of curriculum to get through before May and the Chemistry students couldn’t afford to take up another class period to take the test.

“It was very hard to stay productive over the snow days and study,” Manske said. “It was harder to enjoy [time off] knowing that I had to take a test.”

The district doesn’t think that the loss of school days will result in adding days at the end of the year.