Each winter, students and teachers look forward to the excitement of snow days, but as they begin to pile up, the end of the school year is dreaded as snow day have to be made up.
Currently, in the 2025-2026 school year, Frederick County Public Schools (FCPS) has had a total of six snow days. FCPS is waiting on a state waiver for three snow days, which would make the last day of school Friday, June 12, pending approval.
Unfortunately, there are only five built in snow days in the normal school calendar, and the past two school years have used all five each time.
This leaves students in school until June 17 this year, if all snow days are added on at the end of the year, which is the usual decision.
Making up snow days late into June has been a standard practice for many school districts, but this leaves room for debate because how effective and necessary are these additional days to students’ education?
By the end of the school year students and teachers are checked out and they are burnt out from all the work. Everyone tends to lack motivation to do work and the majority of the assignments are just busy work including movies, pointless assignments, or just doing nothing.
Most, if not all, state testing, Advanced Placement (AP) testing, and county benchmark assessments are done prior to June by the end of May. AP coursework by June is done after the AP exams. Dual-enrollment courses are over by the end of May and grades are reported.
Leaving June to fend for itself in an academic setting or any instructional need.
In the grand scheme of things, it is only wasting both the students’ and staffs’ time. By this time of year, students have checked out and little to no learning will be made.
Seniors are gone and graduated before the year is up for their peers and siblings.
It is also common to see many students and teachers absent during this time of year because they have vacations planned and prior commitments, and simply just don’t want to be at school.
This causes many problems within itself because substitute teachers are in high demand and there is a significant substitute teacher shortage amongst many school districts.
In a survey lead by the American School District Panel, 93% of district leaders reported having moderate or considerable substitute teacher shortages.
There are a few alternatives to adding on additional school days at the end of the year.
One of the solutions is turning snow days into virtual days.
This would require students to attend school in the comfort of their home by possibly joining an online meeting and completing the classwork for the day. Though this would leave many people unhappy because a lot of people enjoy their snow days to themselves and relax.
On March 11, 2026 Frederick County Public Schools held a board meeting where information based on weather closures and the process on applying for a waiver. Waivers are used to disregard school districts from having to meet the 180 day/1,080 hour instructional time requirement. When a waiver is applied for it is then reviewed by the Maryland State Department of Education (MSDE) and the State Superintendent of Schools, and then the approval is decided.
FCPS is still waiting to hear from the state after submitting the waiver. MSDE is required for the school calendar to be adjusted. Hence, the to be determined (TBD) options below.
If too many school closures occur, MSDE is required for the school calendar to be adjusted. For the 2025-2026 school year these days would be taken from the only holidays left after spring break which was decided to not be effected:
- May 25, 2026: Memorial Day: Federal Holiday
- Most federal holidays normally aren’t taken from the schedule
- May 27, 2026: Eid Al-Adha: Muslim Holy Day
Schools going much later into June cause days to be taken off always causes significant problems and leave many people unhappy.
But how far in June is too late to keep students and staff focused, learning, and engaged?
Update from Frederick County Board of Education:
FCPS has requested for a waiver from the Maryland State Department of Education in hopes to reduce the amount of additional instructional days that would be needed to be made up in June. Specifically, FCPS requested that the state waives three instructional days, which would make Friday, June 12, 2026, the last day of school for students.
At the March 24th Board of Education meeting, the request was reviewed, and the Maryland State Board of Education approved to only waive one of the three days. As a result, the last day of school for students will be Tuesday, June 16, 2026, which will also be a two hour early dismissal. For teachers, their last day of school will be Wednesday, June 17, 2026.