By Courtney Lyons, Opinion Editor
The season of snow is now upon us and those of us – such as myself – who live in the Southtowns have the first taste of lake effect snowflakes on our tongues. Snow – especially before Christmas – is picturesque and beautiful as the white powder reflects the sunlight . . . when looking out the window. When looking out the windshield of my navy blue Honda Civic, the novelty wears off with extreme rapidity.
Though my days of flushing an ice cube down the toilet, wearing my pajamas inside out and placing a white crayon in the freezer as a superstitious pre-snow day ritual are over, the Buffalo wintry weather is not. I am an advocate for canceling school entirely when there is inclement weather for the K-12 elementary nostalgia. But I understand that administration, faculty and overachieving students who want to milk every dollar of their tuition money would not look favorably upon such a proposition. My compromise, therefore, is to not wait until the snow has touched down on the pavement and accumulated in our driveways to cancel school. If there is an impending winter storm of snow and/or ice, classes should be placed online as a precaution. If professors do not want to teach online that day, they are at liberty to – like every other class day – cancel. The switch to online classes for the day should be preemptive, meaning the night before. I have had too many nights filled with stress and anxiety as a commuter agonizing over having to drive to school the next day without having any communication about the college’s status the next morning. Sometimes a day-of call is necessary if unexpected weather conditions have occurred. Yet, winter advisories were in place and news channels had been covering the most recent storm for days. But Canisius waited until 6:52 a.m. to tell the campus that classes were online.
If the campus moves to online learning the night before, but a forecasted storm did not materialize as the Channel 2 and 4 meteorologists expected, there will be no harm because students will still be learning in their classes. I understand that moving to online learning for a day is not ideal, but neither is clinging to your steering wheel on a slippery Route 33 in fear while trying not to miss an important lecture.
I am a former commuter student, living approximately a half hour from campus. It is not worth putting our students and faculty at risk when we have the capabilities to easily adapt to online learning for a day. According to the Department of Transportation, over 1,300 people are killed and over 100,000 injured by motor vehicle accidents that occur on snow or ice-ridden roads in the United States every year. School is without a doubt of primary importance, but safety trumps all and is the prerequisite to all activities conducive to scholarship. School is not like policing or medicine, which are jobs that have to be done in person. Keeping students off the roads when there are weather advisories will make the roads clearer, and thus safer for those essential workers who cannot fulfill their occupational duties over Zoom as students can.
As an institution with a large commuter population in a snow-prone area, this issue is of primary importance for Canisius. Not to mention, the City of Buffalo is infamous for its insufficiency in plowing the roads.
I am a staunch proponent of in-person, classroom learning, yet I understand that uncontrollable factors make this unfeasible at times. Keeping campus open on days with poor weather hurts rather than helps students. A lot of commuters refuse to drive in unsafe conditions and fear to make the trek on those days, making them miss class anyway with no way to replicate the class content for that day. Putting classes online will allow more students to participate in class discussions.
My proposal is not new and novel. Canisius, like on Thursday, moved classes online, but the decision ought to have been made the night before. I should not be worrying the night before if I will make it to class in one piece after being compelled to drive to school. It has become commonplace for local school districts to cancel school or move it to virtual learning the night before and I think that Canisius should follow suit. Our safety comes before our scholarship.
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