Being Thankful

I put studded snow tires on my car for the first time, and I have regretted that decision for the most part UNTIL it started snowing last night. On dry pavement my car sounds like a truck coming down the road and it takes about twice as long to stop; and I get white knuckles when going around a tight corner. In the heavy rain on the Thruway (Saturday night) or snow though? Bring it on!

Making Decisions: The West Genesee Middle School rendition of "A Charlie Brown Christmas" (fantastic, by the way) set the stage (no pun intended) for a little sloppy weather. As we head into real winter weather with the possibility of a delay or closing, I wanted to give a quick reminder of where you should go and what you should do to get information from the school as quickly as possible.

First, please know that I do not make a closing or delay decision in a vacuum, nor do I take it lightly. We know that over 10,000 people are IMMEDIATELY impacted when we delay, close, or stay open for that matter when conditions are sketchy.

Thanks to technology, and a LOT of people who work well together to keep staff and students safe, by the time I make the final call about school, we have heard from town and county plows, our transportation department, our plow crew, the police, local meteorologists, neighboring superintendents, and people from different areas of the District. Believe me, the decision can still be "wrong", but I try to do the best job that I can to keep people safe.

Once the decision is made, the first place I announce it is on Twitter (@cbrownwgcsd). Why, you ask? I have been using Twitter to announce school delays and closings since 2007 and it has NEVER failed. I am sticking to what works.

After Twitter, and within one minute of the Twitter post, I have sent an email to all of our employees, and the information is then posted on our website, our Facebook and West Genesee Twitter pages, email and text blasts are sent, and a notification is pushed out on our mobile phone app.

After that, we reach out to local media outlets (within three minutes of the initial Twitter post), and from there, it takes anywhere from one to fifteen minutes for our message to get on television, the radio, or syracuse.com, depending on their mechanism for reporting information that they receive. Where you elect to receive your information really depends on your personal preferences and how quickly you would like to know!

Being Thankful: There are lots of things to be thankful for this Thanksgiving season. My family, our employees, our students, and our community members top the list. Also right up there are our volunteers in our schools who work with our students, and those in the community in our emergency services who keep us safe. We should ALL be thankful to be a part of the Wildcat family.

Enjoy this short week and hopefully time with your families. Safe travels as well!

Chris