WHAT IS SNOW DAY?

Snow at 6:40 a.m. on Dec 3, 2008

SNOW DAY = NO SCHOOL TODAY!!

This is what the German locals ask me on a day like today. As most German kids attend school on foot, are driven by car or take public transportation, most locals do not realize we have our own school busses which have a morning run and two or more after-school runs to make for commuting students.

On a day like today, school gets canceled at both the Frankfurt International School (F.I.S.) and International School Wiesbaden (ISW) campuses. The weather near F.I.S. is very poor today with worse driving conditions. The roads in Frankfurt might look quite good, but out here in the Taunus area, driving can be dangerous. While a few of the forty busses might have been able to run their regular route, other might not have made it at all. Caution and safety are priorities.

Usually this decision is made at the very last minute, which means very early in the morning. Then a chain of phone-calls get set into action, when homeroom mothers call their rounds to parents, principals call teachers, etc. We got our phone-call at about 6:40 or so this morning.

Now at 3:00 p.m. there is still  a lot of snow coming down and I enjoy looking at it. Snow days are great and this one is just in time to prepare our home for this Advent season!

While Germans occasionally enjoy hitzefrei – when the thermometer reaches 27°C in the classroom – and school gets cancelled around before noon, there is no such thing as a Snow day in German schools in central Germany.

Still snowing in the afternoon...