Is it safe enough for school?

By Kyra Klay

We students are definitely not the most experienced drivers. When it comes to snow and inexperienced drivers, it will result in a recipe for disaster. Spring in Colorado tends to bring most of the snow. It could be 55 degrees and sunny one day, but 20 and snowing the next.

According to studies from SafeWinterRoads.org, over 1,300 people are killed and more than 116,800 people are injured in vehicle crashes on snowy, slushy or icy pavement annually. This statistic is referring to all ages, not specifically new or younger drivers but out of the 1,300 killed a large amount of drivers are high school students.

Just this year alone there have been multiple days since second semester started that we still had school and did not even a delay when the roads were extremely unsafe. I am a junior at Legend High School, and I drive an all wheel drive Volkswagen which does not do well in the snow at all. When I wake up in the morning and know the roads are bad, I get nervous when I have to drive in unsafe road conditions. We as students have no choice in going to school and our district needs to be sure they are taking all aspects into consideration before making the decision of keeping school on a normal schedule in adverse weather.

High school students are new to the roads, and are not experienced with driving in bad weather or just driving in general. Having thousands of students on the road during a snowstorm is no where near safe for the students, or anyone on the roads. All in all, Douglas County School District along with all other Districts for K-12 schools need to be on high alert for incoming weather alerts and consideration for students safety when making decisions.