Winter Conditions Make for Challenging Week

Posted in: News Archive

It’s been several years since Brighton and Hove has experienced the kind of weather we had last week, with positively arctic conditions coming from several directions, bringing large areas of the whole country to a virtual standstill.

Whether or not to close any school is a difficult decision to make and must be carefully considered, often within a very short timeframe, usually by the Headteacher.  Of course it is the prime function of the school to educate its students within the school environment for the maximum amount of time allocated, but this is not always possible.

The safety and wellbeing of students, staff and the whole school community must also be a major consideration and Longhill High School presents logistical challenges perhaps not encountered by other City schools.

In fine weather, it would be hard to better the wonderful site at Longhill High, but during a harsh winter it is a different story.  Its position within a deep valley, with the sea only a mile or so away and with roads onto the site being extremely steep, it can become treacherous within a short space of time.  In addition, factors such as whether the school buses are already onsite to transport children home must be considered.

For this very reason, Longhill High School, along with other schools in the City, had to close for two days last week.  We hope that students were able to spend some of their unplanned “snow days” studying at home, as most of them would have homework, revision and projects to work on.  We are sure that they would also have enjoyed getting out into their local environment to enjoy this rare phenomenon we call snow!

Decisions will always be made as quickly and early as possible, with information relayed to parents and staff via our website and by text message.  We would like to thank all parents and students for being understanding during this challenging week and we look forward to better weather and business as usual in the very near future.

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