It’s October and that means a season of snowy conditions may occur.  The decision to run, delay or cancel school during inclement weather prime focus is on the safety of our students. We live in a mountain community with constantly changing road and weather conditions so these can be tough decisions to make.

We make every effort to provide a consistent educational program for our students and get them to and from school safely. Our Transportation Department and our bus drivers are experienced and well trained in winter driving but if parents believe that road conditions are questionable, they have every right to keep their children at home.

It is difficult to delay or cancel school based only on weather predictions since the predictions are not always accurate. When there is inclement weather in the morning, the district’s Manager of Transportation and the Superintendent - in consultation with the NOAA, the National Weather Service, Colorado Department of Transportation and the State Highway Patrol - assess weather and road conditions in addition to student safety concerns. If weather predictions indicate worsening conditions, we will cancel school. If road conditions are poor at 6:00 a.m., but weather predictions indicate quick improve-ments, we will initiate a two-hour delay. In the event of a two-hour delay, buses will run exactly two hours later than normal. Half-day morning preschool and kindergarten pro-grams are canceled if there is a two-hour delay.

Rarely, if ever, do we dismiss school early due to inclement weather. There is rarely a scenario where it is better to send children home in questionable road conditions to potentially empty homes. By 1:00 p.m., we will decide whether to run the Summit Middle School after-school activities buses. In addition, we will decide whether to cancel all after-school activities. It is safer to keep children at school once school is in session than to risk transporting them in adverse conditions.

If and when we make the decision to cancel, delay or dismiss school, we attempt to get that information out as best as we can. To check the status of school, please register for SC Alert at www.scalart.org.  We will email or text you an alert.  You may also call the district’s transportation information hotline at (970) 368-1777. We post this information on our district website www.summit.k12.co.us and notify local and Denver-area media outlets. If there are no reports of a delayed start or cancellation, parents can assume that all schools are operating according to their normal schedule.

Thank you for your patience and understanding regarding this issue.