King School

INCLEMENT WEATHER

Winter weather is on the way. Although rare, it is sometimes necessary to close school or delay the opening of school due to the unsafe weather conditions. In making the decision if schools should remain open or closed, first consideration is given to student and staff safety, while keeping in mind the importance of attendance and learning.

Before the school district makes the decision, local meteorologists, transportation officials, regional school districts, and traffic safety experts are consulted. The school district will attempt to make the decision as early as possible and communicate it quickly to the media and our website. Sometimes it will be possible to make the decision the night before, but often this decision cannot be made until early in the morning. The Student Transportation Department will be distributing the Alternate Emergency Snow Route Stops booklet to students who ride the bus. Please refer to this book when we announce through the media and our website that Portland Public Schools’ buses will be on snow routes.

In the rare event PPS calls a 2 hour late opening on a day your school has a scheduled late opening, school will start 2 hours later than your normal bell time – not 2 hours later than your late opening time. For example if your normal bell time is 8:00 AM, your scheduled late start time is 10:00 AM, and the district calls a 2 hour late opening due to inclement weather school will start at 10:00 AM.

As a general rule PPS will not close schools early. The chances of children arriving home early without parental supervision or the ability to gain entry clearly presents concerns when poor weather conditions are forecasted. All of our schools are capable of providing shelter in place until the end of the school day. As always, parents have the individual choice of picking up their child prior to the end of the school day.

Sometime in November the Snow Books will be distributed to students that ride school buses.

Local radio and television stations will broadcast closure and late opening information. You can also check for updates on the District’s website at http://www.pps.k12.or.us or local media websites. Families will be notified via the Rapid Broadcast System. New this year, the district has set up a Twitter feed to relay closure, delay and emergency information at no cost. You may sign up to receive the free alerts at www.twitter.com. Simply search PPSAlerts and click “follow”. If you don’t already have one, you will need to set up a Twitter account.

SCHOOL FACTS

COURSE SYLLABUS