When We Have to Close School

The state of Illinois requires all schools, public and private, to provide a minimum of 880 instructional hours to students.  This can be done by scheduling the standard 8:30 to 2:50 p.m. school day for 180 days, or, as a private school, we are allowed to determine the length of our instructional day.  Since we are in school for slightly longer than the standard school day, we have some "built in time" to take for emergencies, generally for weather-related closures, the well-appreciated "snow day", or for other emergencies, which can include shut-downs of utilities, water, or incidents such as we experienced this morning, a gas leak.  

Circumstances Which Cause School Closure

The most common reason for closing school in our area is inclement weather.  These conditions are not always easy or accurate to predict, but if driving conditions to and from school are considered risky or unsafe, we will close school.  This would include in the event of an excessive amount of snowfall, preventing the street crews from keeping streets clear, or more likely ice and freezing rain, which makes streets slick and is difficult to melt with salt and clear with a plow.  

Excessively frigid temperatures can also prompt closing school.  The public schools do this to prevent having kids waiting at bus stops, but we do this as well, because there is a risk to transportation in weather like this.  The risk would increase if snow or sleet is accompanying the low temperatures.  

It is not possible for us to have school if utilities are not functioning.  So if water is out, or gas, or electricity, we will cancel classes.  

Excessive absences due to illness is also a factor in determining whether the school will be open or not.  School, by the nature of the activity, is an easy place to spread germs, and when there are multiple cases of contagious virus going around, the number of students who get sick is high.  When that number reaches 20% of our currently enrolled students, we consider closing down to give everyone an opportunity to stay home and get better, and not spread germs while they are contagious.  

How Many Days Can We Miss?

We have not reached the maximum at any point during the seven years I've been here.  The number of days we've taken for illness hasn't been more than one in the past seven years, except for the closure that occurred for COVID during the last nine weeks of the 2020 school term.  

E-Learning, while a possibility, is also a last resort.  It is not as effective when it comes to instruction of students, as the test results and research clearly showed following the last pandemic.  But if we know or anticipate in advance that it might be several days, it does help make some progress while we are waiting to return to school.  

We recognize closures as an inconvenience, to students because it interrupts their learning experience, to teachers because they have a set of specific objectives their students are scheduled to learn during a limited amount of time, and parents, because they have to find child care and make arrangements for their children to be at home when they weren't planning for it.  We take all of that into consideration when we look at the possibility of an unscheduled day away from school.   

Did Jesus Really Say That?!

You have heard that it was said, 'an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.'  But I say to you, do not resist an evildoer.  But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also, and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile.  Give to everyone who begs from you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you.  Matthew 5:38-42 NRSV

Many of our chapel messages recently have focused on the words of Jesus, recorded in the book of Matthew, chapters 5-7, a section known as the "Sermon on the Mount."  Several speakers have focused on the individual principles and values that Jesus taught.  We know that these words more than likely were not just preached this one time, but represented everything that Jesus taught as he travelled around during his public ministry, which took place mostly in Galilee.  

This particular concept was one that our students had some difficulty understanding and figuring out how to apply.  It should be encouraging to know that most of the students remember that their parents have told them not to be the one who hit first, but if someone hits them, then they have permission to hit that person back.  Actually, I think what most of the parents meant is that their child has permission to defend themselves, not retaliate, and there is a difference, though at this particular age, it might be hard to understand.  Still, this is a difficult concept to understand, since we rarely see this happening.  

Main Points We Have Learned

We understand that the words of Jesus, found in the four gospel accounts, but nowhere in any larger segment than here in Matthew 5, 6 and 7, are the Christian gospel.  This is a direct revelation from God, through his son, directly.  They contain the very essence of the Christian faith and its practice.  Many of the statements which teach specific principles of Christian faith start out with the words, "You have heard that it was said," meaning that Jesus was about to put a correct interpretation upon a faith practice which people did not fully understand.  

In fact, in Matthew 5:17-18, Jesus declares himself to be the fulfillment of the law and the prophets, indicating that this part of the gospel of Matthew was the climax, or high point of the Christian gospel, and that his words and interpretations of the faith and practice of Christian principles are the filter and criterion by which all of the rest of the Bible is to be interpreted and understood.  Something that might be very difficult to interpret and figure out otherwise is made clear by these passages of scripture which record the words of Jesus, with all of the authority God gave him to interpret his will for those human beings who placed their trust in God.  

When the Apostles were inspired to capture the thoughts of the faith Jesus taught them, by writing them down, they were guided by the Holy Spirit in the process.  Their authority came from Jesus, and everything they wrote is consistent with the Christian gospel.  There are those who claim the Bible contains contradictions, because it may appear that the apostles disagree, or change something Jesus said, and a surface observation, or reading of a translation, might make it look that way.  But with the understanding that Jesus is the logos, or "word from God" as described in John 1:1, apparent discrepancies are resolved by considering the words of Jesus as being primary, and as being the interpretive criterion for anything else.  Sometimes, it takes an understanding of a cultural aspect that gives meaning to a text which is not seen by us to determine what the author meant.  Bottom line, Jesus is the criterion by which all other scripture should be interpreted.  In Sunday school language, Jesus has the answer.

What we want our students to understand is that the Bible is not difficult to interpret or hard to understand. God sent Jesus for the purpose of serving as the final sacrifice, in order for humans to be redeemed, and reconciled to him, and for revealing his identity and his will, not just for a few people, but for the whole world to know God.  Jesus was very clear in his teaching and preaching, his words are simple.  In fact, if we put all of what Jesus was recorded as having taught by his disciples, the amount of content would be smaller than one of the four gospels.  

And yet. in the context of those words, the Bible interprets itself.  Jesus gives authority, meaning and purpose to life.  He tells us how to know God and understand his will for our lives.  He shows us the values and virtues of the gospel and explains how it is that we can be a testimony to our faith in him by believing what he said and by staying in touch with God through prayer and through the spirit.  

Everyone then who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who builds his house on a rock.  The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall because it had been founded on the rock...

Now when Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were astounded at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as one of their scribes.  Matthew 7:24-25; 28-29 NRSV