Dear Families:
Before extreme winter weather arrives, we want to make sure you know about the various scheduling options we will consider, how to find out about school schedule changes, and our plan for remote learning in the case of an extended closure.
When bad weather becomes a factor in the school schedule, our top priority is the safety of our students, staff, and other members of our community. For each unique weather event, we consider information from several sources to help us decide if we should open on time, open on a delay, close schools, or dismiss early. The most complete resource for information is our Closings, Delays & Early Dismissals web page, which explains our inclement weather decision-making process and details our scheduling options, our decision and communication timelines, all of the ways you can find out about schedule changes, and more.
For your convenience, we have listed below the many ways you can learn the school division’s schedule status during inclement weather:
- School Schedule Hotline: Any community member can call 434-296-5886 to listen to a prerecorded message about school operations for the day. The recording is updated by 5:30 a.m. (Para español, llame al 434-975-9332.)
- Electronic Alert: Phone, Email and/or Text: Parents and guardians are provided an opportunity at the start of each school year to enroll in the Electronic School Notification System to receive notifications from the school division by phone (landline or cellular), email and/or text. Parents and guardians may also enroll at any time or change their preferences by contacting their child’s school.
- Albemarle County Public Schools Website: The division will activate our web alert system to help communicate school schedule changes. The system uses pop-up messages to alert website visitors to important information.
- Social Media: “Follow” us on Twitter, or “Like” us on Facebook.
- Local Media Outlets: School schedule changes are broadcast on several local radio and television stations, as well as local media websites.
ACPS strives to make decisions that impact the school schedule as early as possible to allow families and staff to prepare for the disruption to their schedules. While we sometimes have enough information to communicate a delay or closing the evening before the event, our early morning decision-making process aims to notify families of schedule changes between 5:30 and 6 a.m.
Remote Learning Update: Schools are required to be in session for 180 days or 990 clock hours each school year. Our current school year calendar includes 1,050 hours of instructional time, which provides the equivalent of 10 school days above the minimum requirement. ACPS tracks our use of these “banked” days and hours when we have school delays or closures due to inclement weather. Should weather conditions cause us to miss five school days (or 30 hours of instructional time), the superintendent will decide if we will have remote learning days. If that occurs, remote learning days may be utilized during multi-day closures and could start on the second day or later of each multi-day weather event. Remote instruction may be synchronous (live, teacher-led, and online) or asynchronous (independent). In either case, remote learning will focus on material that already has been taught to students. If remote learning becomes a possibility this winter, your child’s school will share more details with you about expectations for your student.
Again, please refer to our Closings, Delays & Early Dismissals web page at www.k12albemarle.org/closings for more specific details about our inclement weather decisions.
Thank you, and we hope your 2023 is off to a wonderful start!