Schools

Plymouth-Canton Schools Remain Closed Wednesday for Extreme Cold

Plymouth-Canton officials have cancelled school due to inclement weather.

By Nicole Krawcke and Judy Davids

With dangerous wind chills persisting through Wednesday morning, Plymouth-Canton School officials have once again cancelled classes for Jan. 29. 

The National Weather Service has issued a Wind Chill Advisory in effect through 10 a.m. Wednesday. 

According to the district website, students and staff will be updated by 1 p.m. Wednesday on whether or not afternoon and evening activities will take place. 

This is the fifth day Plymouth-Canton officials have cancelled school due to inclement weather.

[Find out how cold it has to be for the district to cancel school.]

The district allows for six days each year for snow or "act of God" type events, according to Kate Dietrich, Plymouth-Canton Schools Director of Communications.

Districts with more than six cancelations, can add days to the end of the school calendar or add minutes to days to make up the time. By state rules, Michigan school districts are required to provide 1,098 hours of instruction over the course of at least 170 days. 

Previously, Gov. Rick Snyder signed legislation allowing schools with too many snow days to avoid having to schedule extra days in the summer. However, the law only applied only to the 2012-2013 school year. It would take another act of the legislature for such flexibility to be available during the 2013-2014 school year.

However, State Rep. Jim Townsend (D-Royal Oak) said there are no serious plans in the works for changing the requirement.

“We’re keeping an eye on this,” he said.

Find out what's happening in Plymouth-Cantonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Townsend said the legislature doesn’t want to be in the businesses of automatically waiving the number of weather-related school closings.  

“Waiving the number of days goes in opposite direct of what research tells us, which is kids need to be in school more, not less,” Townsend said.

Find out what's happening in Plymouth-Cantonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

He also said there are concerns about changing to law too readily.

"We don't want school districts to just expect the waiver and not be ready to deal with the issue of adding days if they need to," he said.


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