Schools closed due to snow
Several schools on the Westside will be closed today because of the overnight snowfall.
There will be no lessons at Aith junior high, or Skeld, Sandness and Happyhansel primary schools, after the respective head teachers decided it was unsafe to open them.
Shona Thompson, executive manager in the schools’ department, said there had been concern over the safety of side roads. She added that gritters would be out treating ‘priority three’ routes this morning.
Update: 7.20am Dunrossness school has been added to the closure list.
Sandra Meades
The West Side schools close on the first day of snow – and rightly so because I would not want my young son on a bus even for local journeys on slippery roads. But what about if he has to go all the way to Lerwick for his secondary education? Anderson High School won’t close just because of snow and ice on the West Side. Will this mean he has to miss out on a day of teaching and have to catch up with his Lerwick class-mates in his spare time (in which he is already disadvantaged in relation to his peers because of the time lost travelling)? Or will there be more pressure on buses from the West Side to run in difficult conditions?