When someone asks the question “exactly who is it that makes the decisions at CWA about inclement weather closings or late openings,” the most appropriate response is “although there is a team of CWA staff involved in collecting the information necessary to make the best decision possible, ultimately the Headmaster makes the final call.”

Making inclement weather decisions is among the least pleasant and satisfying part of a public or private school leader’s responsibilities. A small part of that is physical; it’s hard to avoid getting a bit cranky after several days of going to bed late (due to tracking the weather forecast) and getting up very early to consult and decide what the day’s decision will be.

A larger challenge is that predicting the weather (and the impact the weather outlook will have on road conditions) is a very uncertain enterprise. Even without the presence of microclimates that often leads to significantly varying weather patterns and road conditions throughout the South Sound, we all know that meteorologists have a poor track record in terms of being able to predict the timing and severity of storms.

The inability to tell with any degree of certainty what the weather will hold leads to the inevitability that some weather-related decisions will turn out to be bum calls. Probably out of every ten decisions made, five are pretty much spot on, three are solid but leave some room for doubt, and the last two are ones that I wish we had made differently. And if we are honest, we have to recognize that some of this is due to blind luck, not great skill.

The response of the public at large and/or the school’s constituents is understandably based upon what actually transpires, not on the information that the decision-maker had at the time the decision needed to be made. School leaders are criticized for closing when that turns out to be unwarranted, and criticized when the decision to stay open is made and weather conditions turn out to be worse than anticipated.

In the week prior to the winter holiday break, the Tacoma school district decided to close school on Wednesday and open the following day.  I know the powers-that-be at TPS wish they had made exactly the opposite decisions. University Place decided to close both Wednesday and Thursday, and a few days later the Superintendent was quoted as saying that she wished she had made a different decision on Wednesday and had kept school open that day. Charles Wright was open (with some delayed start times) on both Wednesday and Thursday. Obviously, with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight and with the knowledge that the snow predicted for later Thursday afternoon would come earlier than anticipated, it would have been better to close on Thursday.

I’m in my 20th year of making decisions on behalf of a school about whether and when to remain open, close, or delay the start of the school day. Some days the weather gods make me look like a genius, and other days they make me look like a fool. I’ve been doing this long enough that when I catch myself patting myself on the head on those “genius” days, I never forget that a “fool” day is just around the corner.