Snow day or not?

THE ISSUE: Students in the dark about class cancellation WHAT WE THINK: Use e-mail to alert students of delays

After the standard "How was your break?" conversation, the upcoming snowstorm was the go-to for small talk among returning students this past weekend. When the storm finally arrived and dumped eight inches of snow on Chestnut Hill, Mass., however, students were left unaware of whether classes were cancelled.

Without an e-mail to inform them of the morning University closure, students were left to rely on improvised alerts. A piece of paper taped to the door in the Vanderslice Hall stairway read "Class cxled til noon," and a notice on BCInfo stated, in size 11 font, that the University would reopen at noon.

Outside of these and other small and impromptu alerts, the cancellation traveled largely by word of mouth, leaving students confused about the actual situation. The lack of information ended up inconveniencing students and professors alike who braved the winter conditions to get to their classrooms. Some professors who failed to receive word from the University drove to campus and were surprised to find their classes cancelled for them. Students too were left to peer through the windows of locked classroom doors and wish they could have gone back to bed. Students with off-campus housing and those on Newton Campus were even more put out, having traveled through the winter weather to campus only to have to turn around and go home.

This problem clearly has nothing to do with the capacity to send out a school-wide e-mail, as a university-wide message informed us just last month of the new Master Plan. One can't help but wonder why that system wasn't used on Monday. E-mail has worked well in the past when the University canceled classes. If the school can station a police officer at the Main Gate to redirect Newton freshmen to their residence halls, the school should be able to send a simple e-mail.

The school could also have posted the cancellation someplace more conspicuous than BCInfo. Posting on the BC homepage or Agora would help more people see the alert. Administrators should make important information as accessible as possible, not sequester it to a corner of a subsection of the University's Web site.

Though a little extra exposure to the weather on a snow day is relatively insignificant in the grand scheme of things, communication between the administration and the community should be a high priority. We should be able to have faith that the school is both capable and willing to disclose emergency information if such a situation occurs. Failures like this can't help but undermine confidence that should a real emergency crop up, students will be well-informed.

In the 21st century, it is sad that we should have to ask for the University to send out a school-wide e-mail when classes are canceled. Just a little effort would avoid a lot of confusion and inconvenience for members of the Boston College community.