Snow days are looking different than they did just a few short years ago for students in the county. In past times, waking up to the news of school being canceled due to inclement weather meant a day to sleep in, go sledding and have snowball fights.

While there is still time for those activities, a caveat has recently been added.

Both the Warren County R-III and Wright City R-II School Districts made the decision to close campuses on Wednesday through Friday of last week, following a snow storm that hit the area. But that did not mean that learning or assignments ceased.

Each district used what is called an Alternative Method of Instruction (AMI) option to have students learn from home, allowing the districts to count the snow day as an attendance day.

“A teacher assigns assignments for students to do, and if they complete and turn them in, they are given credit for attendance that day,” explained Superintendent Dr. Gregg Klinginsmith.
While virtual classes are not held, assignments are delivered through either an online platform or in paper.

Both districts have been fielding questions about why the model for snow days has changed. In short, it has to do with meeting state attendance requirements.

“This school year we’re required to have the 1,044 hours of seat time on the calendar,” said Klinginsmith. “Our calendar at R-III is very close to that minimum, so in the case of snow days, we’d either have to make up all the days we missed or use the AMI option.”

Not using AMI presents the challenge of having to determine when to make up those snow days. For R-II, two options are Martin Luther King Jr. Day and President’s Day. However, this latest winter storm occurred past that first day and beyond the cutoff threshold for the latter.

“Right now with the restrictions on our calendar placed on us by state legislators, we are scheduled to get out of school on May 27,” said R-II Superintendent Dr. Chris Berger. “That brings up the question for makeup days. We try not to touch Christmas vacation and spring break because of travel. Then if we have to tack on days to the end of the year, we’re into June, which begins to interfere with the summer school schedule.”

This was the first time using AMI for weather-related closings for either district. R-II and R-III each have 36 hours of AMI available for use, which results in five snow days that don’t have to be made up. While the timing of the introduction of AMI coincides with COVID, administrators said schools in Missouri were already heading in that direction.

“The legislature had already done the work on this prior to COVID,” said Klinginsmith. “With COVID last school year they gave us a thing called AMI-X, where we could close for an extended period of time. This school year we’re required to have the 1,044 hours of seated time on the calendar, but we could use our 36 hours of AMI for either COVID- or weather-related closures.”

Historically, when AMI was used for closing related to COVID, participation has been in the area of 97 percent when it has come to students turning in work.

For a while R-III had been using Mondays as makeup days, given that it practices a four-day school week. However, analysis of the attendance data implied families have become accustomed to this day being available for other tasks.

“When we looked at Mondays when we had to make up our snow days, our attendance was really poor, showing that people have things they are committed to on that day,” said Klinginsmith. “Particularly, we have a lot of high school kids that work on Mondays.”

With AMI being a new approach, districts will monitor the efficacy of it and consider its use in the future. Currently, each district has two remaining AMI days for the rest of the 2021-22 school year.

“Over the upcoming weeks, we’ll be getting feedback from parents, teachers and students as to what the value is of those days. I do think you could make an argument that those days are as valuable as days you could make up in June, because attendance is poor then and it’s after MAP testing,” Klinginsmith said.