If One School Could Open, Why Couldn't Others?

I was talking to my Mum last night and she was ranting on about schools who close at the first whiff of snow. She had seen a report on the TV about a school in Norwich which had remained open, despite all those around it closing.

It turns out that on Thursday and Friday this week, Norfolk had over 350 school closures. This meant that fewer than 30 schools were open. The concern is that some schools appeared to close on a whim, with no effort whatsoever to open or even try to. The teachers at the school in the report were able to get in. Is this school so unique ? Are we truly expected to believe that this school alone is the one and only school in Norwich where all the teachers live locally ? Of course not. This school, no doubt, has teachers from all over the county. The difference between this school and others was the desire to open.

Then there are the excuses used. Some schools claimed their "site was not safe". What does this mean ? Do they mean it had snow and ice outside? So presumably did the one in Norwich (certainly the TV images on Anglia seemed to show this) but it still opened.

Anglia News went to the school to record the fact that it was open, and that children were also allowed to throw snowballs and make snowmen. No "keep of the snow" mentality from the staff. The images showed a school coping with the weather and the children enjoying the snow. No PC rubbish there. So why can Mile Cross Primary School in Norwich do this but other schools totally fail to do so ?

Finally, how could schools that closed on Thursday arbitrarily announce they would be closing for the following day too before they even knew what the roads and weather were like?

I am sure we don't expect teachers to take risks on the roads and I know we all like a day off, but surely there is an expectation that schools and headteachers ought to be doing absolutely everything, even if it involves having a skeleton staff in school, to ensure that schools are open in poor weather. Norwich was not cut off, no roads were blocked, the buses were running. In short, the world had not come to an end, but only Mile Cross Primary School seemed to realise this.