The Griffin-Spalding County Board of Education on Tuesday unanimously approved adding May 26 to the current school year to make up for days missed earlier this year due to inclement weather. This last Thursday in May was originally supposed to be the first day of summer break for students and the first day of post-planning for teachers.

Having to make up one day became necessary for the school system after three days of school were missed in January when snow and ice hit the region.

With the beginning of the school year, all school systems in Georgia had been given four days that they could use as emergency days, and the Griffin-Spalding system opted to use two of those four days to shorten the school year and thus contain costs, leaving it with only two emergency days.

Assistant Superintendent Denise Burrell explained to the board that there are only two ways to make up for the missed days — either extending the school year by one day or adding minutes to existing days.

Proposals for the latter action included adding 10 minutes to 33 school days, from March 7 through April 27, or extending the school day by 30 minutes for 11 days, from March 14 to March 28.

“By far, the biggest crowd-pleaser was adding a day to the end of the year,” she said of feedback she had received. Superintendent Curtis Jones added that conversations he had when he met with the Parent Advisory Council generated the same responses. Principals, he said, were also in favor of making May 26 a school day “because they would be able to make it a worthwhile event for students.”