Monday, January 8, 2018

Snow, Ice, and Cold... Oh My!

Yes, there is snow!
Yes, it is icy!
and oh those temps!

Thank you to all our Shining Stars families for your understanding and patience as we work through this New England weather together.  I'm writing to share a few items with you as we continue in this wintery-weather stretch.  Due to our high traffic volumes today we delayed attendance, and nobody was marked tardy due to the weather-based arrival.

The sidewalks and grounds around our school have shared responsibilities with the DPW and our RPS facilities department.  They work together collaboratively to address the snow needs around the entire town and the school departments.  This is a massive job and one that requires them to be in many places at once.  We appreciate all of their efforts to keep us safe and cleared-out.

As we all know, our school has the best sledding hill in town!  Because of this, we often have more vehicle and foot traffic around our facilities.  With this increased traffic, our school often has compacted ice on the stairway coming up the hill, as well as blacktop clean-up being impacted due to lack of accessibility. If you are utilizing the hill during fun sledding hours, please encourage your children to walk up the hill rather than the staircase.

Also - please note that the  DPW does not treat town walkways or sidewalks with salt or ice, so the sidewalks beyond those in front of the school would not be treated with salt or sand.  (This includes the path through the field by the hill.)

I am meeting with the director of facilities to consider if there are other ways we can collaborative to help ensure our grounds our safe.

In the meantime;

  • Take it slow!  If you're driving down Edgemont or our side streets please slow your speed.  Our youngest learners are hard to see behind the larger snowdrifts
  • Remind your students it can be slippery - and encourage walking feet rather than running on sidewalks
  • Please reach out to me should you have any concerns or questions


Thank you for all you do - stay warm and stay safe out there!