text: Schools often close because of extreme weather, such as snow days. Although snow days are usually celebrated by students as a reprieve from the burdens of school, multiple snow days can interrupt a student's learning and lead him or her to struggle later on. After missing days of school, teachers can feel rushed to get through their material, so they spend less time on parts of a lesson, leaving students with gaps in their learning. If school is canceled for a long period of time, students can forget what they had learned and lose their focus. Coupled with the rushed teaching at school, students can significantly fall behind in school. This can lead to a drop in the student's self esteem, since they feel they cannot understand the material. In my experience, whenever school was canceled for a long period of time, this was the pattern. In an online school setting, classes would not be canceled because of weather or other conditions, so the teacher would not have to rush, students would not lose their focus, and students' self esteem would not drop.