To Snow or Not to Snow

          Winter Term at Lawrenceville tends to feel like a hectic and overloaded few months—often seeming to be a never-ending trickling stream of major assignments. When combined with early sunsets and sub-zero weather, the winter certainly does not help the mood on campus. That is, unless, first thing in the morning, you peer out of your window and promptly notice that everything outside is covered in a white blanket of powdery snow! For almost all students in Mercer County this week, this snow covering meant a snow day, an extra day off for binge-watching favorite television shows and catching up on some sleep, but for Lawrenceville students, there was no change to the regular day of class. Would a snow day have been a better option?

          Disappointment was common for students across campus. Claire Jiang ’24 remarked, “we have days off for severe weather, like in the instances of hurricanes, but I feel like it would be nice to have a day off for students to play and be kids again—there is just so much excitement in snow, when students and kids can go sledding and snow building. At the same time, I get why school was not canceled. It is probably because we have days set aside for other types of planning and events, but still, a snow day off would be great.” 

          History faculty member John Hughes also believes in the magic of a snow day. “Since we have not had measurable snow in over 700 days, there’s a magic to it and we should let kids be kids again, which is where the joy in it lies.” 

          On the other hand, other faculty, such as Science teacher Stephen Laubach P’23 disagree, explaining, “I’m from the upper midwest, so I’m used to a much higher threshold for school getting canceled. Also, since two-thirds of our student body are boarders, they are here at school, do not need to worry about transport to school, and the day students in my classes could cautiously get here.” 

          While Laubach took no issue with classes resuming, he did make use of the snow day, “I was out in the snow a lot… I love it! I went sledding for a bit and went Nordic skiing over the weekend. I also took my students in my Honors Environmental Science class out for a snowball fight for the last ten minutes of class and took our other Lawrenceville students to Blue Mountain in Pennsylvania. I love snow, and this is one of the things that makes me sad about climate change. When I get to go out in the snow, it makes my Mondays get better.” 

          Yet, the proposed snow day brings up a perpetual issue within the school community: the division between day students and borders. Should day students take the risk and drive on the icy roads to school simply because most of the student body are boarders? Maybe we will find out next year!