When is it cold enough to close schools?
After Naperville Unit District 203 Superintendent Dan Bridges posted on his Twitter account Thursday night that he was monitoring weather conditions to determine if school would be in session Friday, he was flooded with hundreds of tweets begging him to call off classes.
Ultimately, those pleas fell on deaf ears as Bridges announced early Friday morning that school was a go.
"We don't have a hard and fast rule when to close schools for cold weather," said the district's communications director Sinikka Mondini. "The ultimate goal is to keep kids safe and keep them in school."
Mondini said Bridges was in consult with other area superintendents and the DuPage Regional Office of Education before making the decision. In the end, only a few schools in northern Lake and McHenry counties canceled classes Friday.
Despite predictions that temperatures weren't going to get much above zero degrees all day, that's not cold enough for most schools to cancel classes.
"For cold weather closures, we have a response plan we put in place several years ago and it sets the bar for anyone to understand," said Palatine-Schaumburg High School District 211 spokesman Tom Petersen.
Forecasts of sustained wind chill of negative 30 degrees or lower or sustained temperatures of minus 15 degrees or lower will get school canceled at most districts in Northwest Suburban Cook County, Petersen said.
"This took the guessing game out of whether we'll be closed or not," he added.
In other districts, officials are far more apt to make the decision case-by-case.
"While there is no set standard, we typically get concerned when there's a sustained wind chill of negative 25 or below," said Elgin Area Unit District 46 CEO Tony Sanders. "We actively monitor weather and have subscribed to a service that provides us with up-to-date alerts that are specific to the 90 square miles we serve."
There are a lot of variables that go into determining whether to close schools due to cold, said St. Charles Unit District 303 spokeswoman Carol Smith. The readiness of the schools, buses and other equipment and facilities needed during the school day are all taken into account, she said.
"Transportation is a really important issue," Smith said. "Seventy-eight percent of our students ride the bus."
Some parents believe elementary and unit districts are quicker to cancel classes than high school districts because the students are older and better equipped to take care of themselves.
However, Mondini said that's not necessarily the case.
"You have to think about all students, including some seniors who maybe aren't dressing appropriately to walk to school," she said.
District officials said they continue to monitor the weather forecasts for the coming days as temperatures are expected to warm up slightly this weekend and then dip back down even colder next week.