Inclement Weather

In the event of bad weather and very hazardous road conditions throughout the county, school closings, delayed opening, and early dismissal announcements will be communicated as soon as possible following a decision by the superintendent to close, delay , or dismiss schools and/or offices early. If schools and/or offices are closing for the day or there is a delayed opening due to inclement weather, whenever possible, decisions will be made no later than 5:30 a.m. If schools and/or offices are dismissing early due to inclement weather, whenever possible, the announcement will be made no later than 10:00 a.m.

Announcements will be communicated through the following: BCPS web page; BCPS news email and text message alerts; BCPS information hotline (410/887-5555); BCPS TV; BCPS Twitter and Facebook accounts; local radio/tv station; and systemwide phone notification, as determined by the superintenedent.

Area Schools Cancelled or Delayed

Please don’t call the school – we need our lines to call out.  You have other options.     

    You pick, but start planning ahead. BE PREPARED!  Make sure you have a back-up plan for early closings.

    Phone Tree Protocol In Case of Early Dismissal

    BCPS Policy states that in the event of a countywide early closing, individual schools do not need to contact parents. In the event that Riderwood alone needs to close early, the following protocol will be followed:

    1.  The home room teachers will notify the room parents of the early dismissal time. Please make sure your child’s teacher has all numbers where they can contact you. Although the school has the ability to send out an automatic phone message to notify parents of early dismissal, Baltimore County does not allow elementary school students to be sent home without a school representative speaking directly to a parent approved adult.

    2.  The phone tree parents get the calls out. If they are unable to reach a parent, they will try an alternate person from the list of contacts that was provided by the parent.

    3.  Calls will continue until either a parent or approved alternate is spoken to directly.

    4.  Once all calls are made, the phone tree parents will contact the room parent to let them know exactly who was contacted for each child (parent, approved alternate etc.), and how the child is to go home.

    5.  The room parent will contact the home room teacher and report exactly who was contacted for each child. Please make arrangements with your home room teacher on how to best contact them be it via e-mail or cell phone.

    6.  The home room teacher will provide the office with this information so if a parent calls in looking for their child, they can be told exactly to whom the child was released.

    7.   We reiterate, a child will only be dismissed from school if a parent or approved alternate adult was spoken to directly.

    It is very important that the calls get out quickly so that the teachers know exactly what is going on before the actual early dismissal time. This can be quite challenging so room parents, please enlist the help of a few parents in each class to spread the wealth of responsibility.

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