Including the snow day we had earlier this school year, we have now had a total of five snow days this year.

On Tuesday, January 6, school was closed because of bad weather. Wednesday and Thursday we did not have school because of cold temperatures. This led students to question why we had school Friday, January 9.

The high school is a special case because the juniors park at the stadium, as well as behind the middle school, which equates to an extremely long walk to the doors at the high school.

“It feels horrible,” said junior John Garrison, who is assigned to the far lots. “It feels like I’m walking in the Antarctic.” Garrison arrives to school at 5:45 a.m. for ROTC practice and still must park behind the middle school.

Even though quite a few students drive, the majority still ride the bus. Riding the bus does not change the condition of the roads. While buses provide transportation to students, they are already overcrowded and if students were to not drive and take the bus, it would be worse. Twice this year, during winter conditions, the same bus has been late.

“Riding the bus in the winter, it is just always cold,” said sophomore Kylie Bever.

Also, every high school student has to walk outside to their math class. Union Elementary also has trailers for some of its students.

“It feels like it’s negative 10 when you walk outside because the wind hits you,” said senior Cassie Williams, who describes the walk like a wind tunnel. Williams goes to math class during fifth period. “I almost fall every day on the ice.”

Some students take a coat, while others choose to not take a coat and freeze.

“It is annoying you have to carry around a coat, just to go to one class,” said senior Josh Cyr, who ventures to and from the math trailers during first period.

Others, however, disagree.

“I don’t think that it is a big deal to have to go outside for math. You don’t have to be outside for that long,” said senior Derrick Butler.

Winter weather hit at this time last year, but Northmont has already missed five days at this point, which is more than last year.  Northmont missed a total of seven school days with several two-hour delays.

“In years past on the snow days, Northmont made bad calls because we could’ve gone to school. But this year, they made good calls to not go to school, it was just horrible because it was exams,” said senior Jacqueline Tyler.

Students found it difficult to have school Monday after Winter Break, miss three days, then come back on a Friday. School was then cancelled on Monday, January 12, with exams looming.

“The problem isn’t how many snow days we had, it was the days the snow days were on,” said Cyr.  “We ended up having a day to get ready.”

Even with exemptions, students felt anxiety.

“It was just a mess,” said senior Tori Amos, who ended up exempting two exams.

Besides exam grades, students also worried about the effect on their quarter grades.

“After break, we all felt like we had a week and a half to get our grades up, but with the snow days, we had more like two,” said senior Eve Stebel.

This year, exam grades really took their toll on students because of the snow days just before exams, which could be remedied by having exams before Winter Break.

“Why don’t we take our exams before Winter Break?” asks senior Emily Hope, who says Winter Break is spent with family and Netflix, not studying for exams.

Sometimes it is crucial to be at school, even though the weather makes us not want to go.