breaking news

Benton County Schools Say Choice to Stay Open Was Right Decision

By: Tyler Thomason

Updated: February 21, 2013

"This morning was pretty tough because it was changing," says David Cauldwell of the Rogers school district.

"Saw some rain, some freezing rain."

A pop quiz from mother nature.

Leaving schools in Benton county with a couple options: open or close.

"We feel like me made a good call," says Mary Ley of the Bentonville school district.

Both Bentonville and Rogers kept class in session Thursday, which led to quite a few empty seats.

Something Cauldwell expected.

"It can be real nice in one area and not very good in another area."

And with the fear of roads freezing over, some folks took to social media expressing concern.

"We do respect their opinions and our Facebook did have a lot of opinions on it today," Ley says.

"It's good to have feedback and then reflect, 'Did we do the right thing?'"

Ley believes the right decision was made despite a fender bender involving one bus, and a minor power outage at the high school.

"It only took them a minute or two to figure out what the situation (power outage) was," Ley says.

"Students are invested in so many wonderful and great things, it's a real struggle when we have to cancel."

Cauldwell agrees.

"There are a lot of problems with not having school... if we feel like a good majority of our kids can make it safely, then we try to have school."

District officials say the decision has to be made by 5:30 on the morning of wintry weather and this latest decision seems to be getting an A+ from administration.

"I think confidently, that we made the right call today," Ley adds.

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