One NJ district had a ‘snow day’ Friday while kids were at school

This is the kind of school everyone’s kids should attend. Not only do they not believe in switching to remote learning on days the weather makes travel unsafe and opting instead to keep the tradition of snow days, they did something amazing on Friday.

Read More: Sledding and snowball fights: What’s the appeal?

I’m talking about Stillwater Elementary in Sussex County.

According to nj.com, Stillwater has a population of around 4,000 people and only one school. It’s a 28-square-mile rural New Jersey town that still believes in doing things the old-fashioned way.

On Friday, with plenty of snow still on the ground but temperatures warmer than earlier in the week, the school made a fun decision. Instead of making all the kids have recess indoors in the gym, they had them put on their snow boots, snow gear, heavy coats, hats, and gloves, and let them have an hour-long mini snow day. While at school!

Everything stopped, and about 300 kids got to play in the snow.

That’s the entire student body, all at once, all together, making snow angels, kicking around a volleyball in the powdery white stuff, playing their hearts out, and even cheering on an outdoor science experiment, as a school community.

I love this. To teach kids, first you must “get” kids. This school and its superintendent, Danny Papa, clearly gets them. Kudos to Stillwater for holding what they called a “Winter Snow Play Day.”

Schools that remember how to have fun woven into the 180 days a year will undoubtedly have more successful students by making them want to be there.