The sun was shining by 8:30 a.m. this morning, leaving some parents to wonder about the necessity of a fourth, full-day school closure. And as local districts tick off the available snow days in the school calendar, people want to know: how are snow days declared and how many are left before future vacation days are taken away?

 Patch caught up with Jere Hochman, Bedford Central Schools superintendent, via email at 11 p.m. last night, as he was monitoring the latest weather reports. He verified that today’s closure was the last one built into the school calendar.

 “We have four snow days built-in, and the make-up days are designated on the calendar,” he said. “We also look at our total student attendance days compared to the state minimum and determine if we can use those above the minimum. We are analyzing that now and will get information out to everyone next week.”

The make-up days are also designated as Spring Break, plus the following Monday: April 18-22, and 25.

Hochman works with several key staffers to make cancellation decisions, including Tom Turner, transportation director, and Mark Betz, assistant superintendent for business. Together they monitor forecasts from several websites and subscription-based weather service that provides weather information targeted to the district via phone and email.

Calling a snow day means an early start for district administrators.

“Starting at around 4:00 a.m., Tom Turner begins checking the roads and getting calls from various “spotters” in the area who report road conditions,” said Hochman. “He calls me and reports on what he’s heard—sometimes I talk with one other superintendent but we tend to rely on the transportation directors talking. Once in a while I will go out and drive just to get a sense of the roads.”

 Decisions are made between 5:15 a.m. and 5:30 a.m.—anything later challenges transportation and food service systems and the administrators and teachers who have long drives to school, said Hochman.

Winter fatigue is setting in for parents of school-aged children, who are running out of snow-day activities and missing out on school.

“I don’t mind the snow so much,” says Gina LeDone, a mother of three from Bedford.  “But I worry about my daughter in high school missing so much school with mid-terms coming up. Even my younger kids say they are bored and would rather be at school with their friends.”

And Katonah mom Nikki Lipari says she has had just about enough.  “The white Christmas was nice and the snow has been fun, but I am done.” She says she worries that February could be even worse.  “It has been a tough winter so far.”

Over at the Pedigree Ski Shop in Bedford Hills though, there are no complaints. “We have never seen a season like this,” says Rich Margiloff, a salesperson with the shop for seventeen years and at the Bedford Hills location for eight years. “It has been crazy—we are sold out of season rentals for used skis and snowboards and we’re selling out of snow shoes too.  And many kids are doing a lot of these snow sports right in their backyard.”