Fayette County, WV (WOAY) – Southern West Virginia students have missed a lot of school this year due to winter weather.
“Fourteen days in our calendar, we have missed fourteen due to snow.”
That was the number Fayette County Schools Superintendent David Warvel gave in an interview with WOAY-TV on Monday, February 25th. School was cancelled in Fayette County the following day, quickly moving that number up to 15.
Under state rules, counties get five traditional snow days and five non-traditional learning days for a total of 10 days that don’t need to be made up. After that, every missed day gets added on to the end of the school year.
For Fayette County, that currently means makeup days will begin at the end of May and go into the beginning of June, but Warvel is trying to make some of those missed days up before summer arrives.
“We have what they call PL days for professional learning,” explained Warvel. “We have been able to swap out one of those days already.”
That day was February 16th, Presidents’ Day, and kids found themselves at school when they otherwise would have had the day off.
For some of the days missed this year, relief may be coming from the state level. County superintendents are being asked to fill out documentation, potentially erasing some instructional time that’s been missed.
“The state has asked for us to fill out a survey to maybe, possibly get five days waived during that time that the Governor declared a state of emergency or told people to stay off the roads because it’s dangerous,” said Warvel.
In 2025, the state Superintendent granted waivers to eight county school systems, which allowed them to end the year short of the 180-day requirement after severe weather and flooding took place.
Warvel says he’s holding off on making any more changes to the 2025-2026 calendar until he finds out if any instructional time will be waived, but he doesn’t want to keep kids in school into the summer if he can avoid it.
“Let’s be honest, when it gets really pretty outside in June, I don’t care if you’re a kid or an adult,” said Warvel. “It’s nice to look out a window, say, man, look how warm and sunny it is. I’d rather be outside.”
The waiver process is just getting started for this school year, and there’s no word yet on when and if any instructional-time debt will be slashed. Fayette County’s current last day of school, barring any additional closures, waiver relief, or calendar changes, is set for early June.
