With remote teaching mastered, University of Missouri won’t have snow days ever again
Students might disagree, but University of Missouri officials say they found a “silver lining” in all the disruption caused by coronavirus: No more snow days, maybe forever.
MU announced on Wednesday that it would no longer cancel classes because of bad weather. Instead, students and professors will just carry on online.
“The pandemic provided us with the ability to test our moxie related to remote teaching and we feel like we learned a lot,” said Christian Basi, university spokesman.
“It is definitely something that could certainly happen over the course of a day or two if we need it. It’s been proven that we are able to maintain a vast majority of the operation and the teaching with the technology that’s now available.”
Like colleges across the country, MU went to online-only classes in March when the coronavirus pandemic hit. The university brought students back to campus this fall but expanded the online class offerings, including some classes where some students were in-person while the others connected remotely. After Thanksgiving, classes went back to online only. Students were asked to go home for the holiday break and not return to campus until January.
A note to the campus community explained that “under severe weather conditions, university officials may open campus late, close campus early, or close campus and UM System office buildings for an entire day. Even if campus is not open, classes and work will continue, ensuring that students can make academic progress and productivity is maintained.”
In 2020, MU has closed campus because of snow or ice three times. The previous school year, it was five times. Before 1998, canceling class because of snow was rare. The first time it happened was 1949 and it was for one day. Classes were canceled again, once in 1978, 1995.
Under the new policy, students, faculty and staff will be notified of snow days by the MU alert texting system. Each professor will have a previously distributed plan for students about connecting to class remotely. Some staff and faculty, whose jobs cannot be done from home, may have other arrangements set by their boss.
The idea is likely to spread, even to area school districts. School leaders were broaching the subject soon after the pandemic began.
