R-5 opts out of Missouri snow day forgiveness bill

Nevada Daily Mail

Students in Nevada won't be getting a shortened school year. They'll have to stay in class until May 25.

During its regular meeting on Wednesday, the Nevada R-5 Board of Education decided not to take advantage of a bill recently signed by Governor Matt Blunt that would waive the make-up days for any days missed between Jan. 11 and Jan. 22.

Many school districts already schedule additional days in their calendars to make up for days missed due to winter weather.

But an ice storm in January knocked power out in parts of the state for more than three weeks, pushing some schools past the extra days they had built into their schedules.

Typically, schools that exceed their scheduled snow days must add up to eight days to make up for missed classes. Beyond that, schools need to make up for half of the lost time.

The bill exempts any district that canceled classes for weather between Jan. 11-22 from the makeup requirement. It won final legislative approval Tuesday in the House with a 150-7 vote, after clearing the Senate earlier in the day on a 33-0 vote. Noah pointed out that the district had missed five of those days -- Jan. 16, 17, 18, 19, and 22.

"We would have the opportunity to move our last day of school, which is currently scheduled for May 25, back to May 18," Noah said. "After meeting with building level administrators and discussing all of our options we feel it is appropriate to keep the last day of school as scheduled for May 25. We feel that we have 174 days worth of material and we just couldn't cover it in 169 days."