DOE: 46 Percent Of Students Attended NYC Public Schools Wednesday

By: Lindsey Christ

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Even though Wednesday was not a snow day for city school children, less than half of them ended up coming to class due to the storm.

The Department of Education says 50.5 percent of the city's elementary school children showed up.

View the full break-down of school attendance rates.

For middle schools, attendance was at 47.5 percent, and only 37.2 percent of high school students showed up.

Schools Chancellor Cathie Black said the decision not to call a snow day was made at 5:05 a.m. after speaking with the commissioners from both the Sanitation Department and the Office of Emergency Management, as well as other city officials.

"Education as you know is our number one priority, so we'll do everything we can to make sure the kids can get to school safely and can get an education," said Black. "The last thing we want to do is close schools and put 1.1 million children wandering around with nothing to do."

"It's very difficult for a lot of parents who work if there is a snowday," said Mayor Michael Bloomberg. "They just don't have places to leave their children and so they have to lose a days pay."

The Department of Education says it won't know how many teachers were absent for several days. The DOE also wouldn't give out any information about how busy the substitute processing center was, although anecdotal reports from school officials suggest the phonelines for requesting substitutes were busy all morning.

Children and parents who did show up to school and spoke with NY1 said they were a little disappointed, but agreed with the decision.

"I was pretty confident about having a snow day because it was supposed to be a storm. But of course we didn't get a snow day, but it's okay," said one child.

"As much as I would like them to go to school today, it's a huge disappointment because I remember how much fun it was to have a snow day," said a parent.

"Oh I think it's fine, it's fine. It's fun in the snow and, you know, I think it didn't materialize such a bad storm, so it's fun. It's fun," said another parent.

After-school programs also went on as scheduled, but field trips were postponed.

New York City schools have only closed six times for snow since 1978.