Calamity Day Update

Dear Mechanicsburg Staff, Students, and Community Members:

As you know, the district has currently used a total of eight calamity days.  

The state of Ohio allows all districts to close for up to five calamity days per school year, which do not have to be made up. If school is closed for more than five days, the state requires those days to be made up in some way.

According to the Mechanicsburg Exempted Village School District calendar, we have 3 calamity days built into the board approved calendar.  Those dates are March 21st, 24th, and 25th. We will be in session on the 21st, and 24th as of today, January 29th.  

Additionally, in order to increase instructional time with students we are canceling the teacher professional development day scheduled for February 14th, 2014. This day will become a “regular” student in session school day.  Adding this day of school will give us a full week of instruction with students (hopefully) and one additional built in make up day (3/25) before the end of the school year, as it seems we are in for what they say is a very “snowy” February.  The teacher professional development day will be placed at the end of the school year, as the state has approved us for 3 waiver days and those are considered to be part of the total number of student days required.  Additional adjustments in the calendar may be necessary as we move through this “exceptional” winter season.  

With the potential for 4 make up days ( 2/14, 3/21, 3/24, 3/25) during the school calendar, the district is not currently seeking emergency “blizzard bag” approval from the department of education.  If this position changes, we will provide each family with log in information or hard copies of work to be completed at home during a calamity day.  

In addition, it is being reported  that Governor Kasich has asked law-makers to consider adding additional calamity days for each district.  Therefore, it is important to understand that our plan to make up school days will continue to unfold as we hear more from state legislatures.  We will keep you posted as we are provided more information, which may be available as early as week’s end.

Please refer to the district website, https://twitter.com/DanielleMProhas, and one call announcements for more information.  

Sincerely,

Dan Kaffenbarger

Danielle Prohaska