UPDATED: Derbyshire school closures due to snow

“Sorry, that should read 47 hours, not 43.”

“by Anony___Mouse
"Thats probably because some of us WORK for a living. You know the word WORK - its a word thats not in the teachers vocabulary."

Oh dear Anony__Mouse, it appears you need to go back to school and learn to read a complete comment before trying to rip it to pieces. It's not the rank and file teachers who decide to close a school, it's the headteacher. Most of them are now so paranoid about a pupil slipping on ice whilst on school grounds, injuring him/herself and then their money-grabbing parents seeing it as a way to make a fast buck by suing the school.

My wife was a teacher for 30+ years; her normal working day was from 07.15-17.00 and then 19.00-21.00 for 4 days a week (43 hours) plus another 3-4 hours over the weekend taken up with more marking, lesson preparation and general admin. Before you start attacking teachers, I suggest you get your facts into perspective.”

“This is a film showing the winter of 1962-1963, we still went to school in this weather - no days off! http://tinyurl.com/ahl8vbh”

“I can remember walking the mile distance to Allenton Primary school (a school made up of a series of wooden sheds) during the winter of 1962-63, no one at the school apart from the teachers had a car, so we all walked there every day regardless of the weather.

The snow had been falling since the end of November 1962 and it had frozen into hard packed drifts of up to ten feet in height. Snow ploughs were used to clear part of our route along Harvey Road, but worst of all, we had to dig our way out of our houses as snow had drifted up against the outside of the modern terraces, blocking the front doors and the entries. We used our coal shovel to dig our way out.

The school was open as usual, the teachers had set up some two bar electric heaters in the classrooms so that the 35 children in each classroom could keep warm. The toilets were outside and icicles hung from the cisterns over the toilet seats, the head teacher came out with a kettle of boiling water to melt the ice in the toilet bowls every few hours.

During our breaks, we would make snowmen and have snowball fights, but no one missed a day at school despite the weather.

The snow eventually melted away by the end of the first week in March and it caused disruption for everyone, but we kids thought it was great fun and we were sorry to see the snow melt away.
Now it only takes two inches of snow for the schools close down!”

“If teachers were paid hourly their salaries would be doubled, before you judge and pass comment try doing the job yourself, I know teachers that buy materials out of their own pocket because schools don't have the budgets to buy the most basic materials. would you do the same?”

“Should the football be on? and what about airport closures?”

“Come on - should schools near the following roads be open or closed?

"There are also reports that there may be more snow on the way this afternoon and some schools have closed due to the conditions.

Updated 1pm

A yellow alert for snow has been given for Derbyshire by the Met Office for the rest of the day. There are no weather warnings for the rest of the week so far but more snow is forecast for later on in the week.

Updated at noon:

Roads in Derbyshire have been closed due to snow fall and crashes.

The A515 which links Ashbourne and Buxton has been closed due to the conditions.

Three vehicles crashed on the road due to snow and vehicles were struggling to pass close to the junction for Parwich.

There was also a crash on the B5035 involving the mobile library and two other vehicles. Police are yet to confirm if this was due to the conditions but it is believed to have been.

Slack Hill is also seriously delayed due to the conditions between Ashover Road and Asker Lane."
- this info is from today's paper”

“a joke”

“Pay all the teachers by the hour instead of a yearly salary. Then see how quick they are to close the schools for a bit of snow.”

“Pay all the teachers by the hour instead of a yearly salary. The see how quick they are to close the schools for a bit of snow.”