Days Creek Charter School got to put its new power outage procedure into play quicker than expected Oct. 10 when the lights went out on students coming to school.
When Days Creek experienced its second outage in three weeks, families were notified around 7 a.m. and students were returned home on the buses they came on.
It was a sharp contrast to the Sept. 25 outage, in which students were kept on campus in the dark rather than risk sending elementary students home to possibly empty houses. The school also realized from the earlier outage that it could not communicate with homes as the school’s phones operate via the internet.
“After the events on the 25th, we set a new course on how we manage things,” Days Creek superintendent Joe LaFountaine said.
After school was cancelled on Oct. 10, all bus riders were successfully returned to their homes except one. That student was picked up by a guardian midmorning, LaFountaine said.
“It was a good idea sending everybody back home rather than keeping us here,” freshman Missy Kobata said.
LaFountaine said that the power outages were a wake-up call for the school and gave it a chance to improve its response.
“While these events are random, or seem random, that doesn’t mean we don’t have a plan for addressing them,” he said.
La Fountaine said that the school is purchasing 800-amp generators that could keep the school running during other power outages.
“Currently we have a generator, but it’s so small it only keeps our freezers going,” he said.
The extra day off disrupted homecoming week slightly; voting for homecoming king and queen had to be conducted via email survey. Seniors Isaiah Sprague and Natalie Harris were voted king and queen, respectively.
