Universities closed for morning following storm

Saint Mary's decides to stay open

King's students navigated a sloppy campus today when classes resumed. Photo: Emilie Bourque

Sunday night’s storm brought snow, rain and slippery driving conditions to metro Halifax, and for many university students, a couple of extra hours of sleep this morning.

Many of the area’s universities cancelled classes between 9 a.m. and noon. The only exception was Saint Mary’s University. Gabrielle Morrison, vice-president academic for Saint Mary’s University, said the institution’s administration had monitored the storm since Sunday and based on what they saw, made the judgment not to close. “We followed our standard protocol,” she said.

Dalhousie University did cancel classes until 11:30 a.m. Charles Crosby, media relations officer with Dalhousie, said the university’s president and director of security made the decision to cancel classes. “Ultimately I think the main thing they’d be taking into consideration is safety issues,” said Crosby. “We were getting word from the city and from the police telling folks to stay off the road at that time unless absolutely necessary.”

The University of King’s College cancelled most classes until 11:30 a.m. Nadine LaRoche, communications co-ordinator with King’s, said the school has two policies on class cancellations. The first is individual. “If it’s difficult or unsafe for students to make it to campus, they shouldn’t,” she said. The second policy is to follow the decision of Dalhousie University because many King’s students also take classes at Dalhousie.

But King’s didn’t cancel all of its classes. LaRoche said the 9:35 a.m. Foundations Year class ran as usual because many of the students live in residence and would have little difficulty getting to class.

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