As the cold weather approaches administration of schools all over will be faced with the challenge of when it will be safe for their students to attend school. When the decision of cancellation comes up we need to take into full consideration the weather factors students deal with daily.

When deciding whether or not school should be canceled or delayed for the day, some of the factors looked at include: road conditions, heating systems at the school and ice on electricity lines. All the elements considered that storms bring are valuable to take time to look through. Although there isn’t enough attention brought to the students on how they will get to school.

Students in high school are starting to become young adults and gain responsibility. For many this is the first time they will begin to drive alone. Becoming a new driver is a stressful affair just in itself but adding extreme obstacles such just makes it worse.

So when the bad weather hits why are we putting new drivers at risk? MOTO [Missouri Transportation Organization] safety.com did a blog series on teens driving in extreme weather conditions. They found that teen drivers are more likely to be involved in an automobile accident than drivers in any other age group during winter driving time. We have to highly consider this fact when we are deciding if our students should attend school.

Without taking time to consider the safety of all the different ways students get to school it isn’t right for administration to make a decision on if students will attend school for that day.

Kids who have the ability to be able to drive to school are still better off than those who have to walk. The amounts of kids walking to school has declined over many years but there are still students who we have to make sure we consider. Another majority of kids take the city bus to school and waiting for bus in freezing weather is safe for students.

Even for the little time kids may be waiting at a bus stop or walking to school their bodies could be in serious danger. An article by Amanda Chatel from BUSTLE.com mentions a study done by Yale University that states that the common rhinovirus that many people refer to as the “cold” thrives in the cold temperature. The cold weather also highly affects other parts of the body such as your skin, body temperature and heart.

Kids who are sent to school on days that are too cold won’t be able to function properly when on their way to school their bodies are affected by the cold weather. If we want students to do well in class we need to make sure the conditions that face their bodies aren’t causing a interruption on their process of learning.