Snow Day: Blizzard Shutters Schools Across Region

Snow days for the New York City public school system do not come easily, but with forecasts predicting about two feet of snow and wind gusts up to 65 miles per hour, the decision to keep students and school staff home on Tuesday came early on Monday. 

"It is really important also that parents consider the safety of their children, and in the coming days – between today and tomorrow – that they keep the kids home, and reading a good book is not a bad way to spend a day off from school," said Chancellor Carmen Fariña.

But it's only a one-day break. Mayor Bill de Blasio announced on Tuesday morning that school would resume on Wednesday.

For a full list of school closings in the region, check here, courtesy of CBS New York. And WNYC is providing continuous storm updates.

High school students scheduled to take Regents exams Tuesday will instead take them on Thursday. If a student has to take more than two examsThursday, he or she will work with their school to manage the load, according to a Department of Education spokeswoman.

And with subways shutting down Monday night, it remained uncertain whether schools would re-open Wednesday, even if the storm passed. Mayor Bill de Blasio said city officials would make that call with more information as the storm developed.

"We're going to give people some prior sense of where we're going as soon as we have a sense of how bad this is," the mayor said.

For the students with a day off from school, the storm is not a bad thing at all. 

Neice Rodriguez, a sixth-grader in Brooklyn, said her classmates plan to spend their day off sledding or chucking snowballs.

"If there's a lot of snow they're probably going to go outside and play around," she said, adding she had other plans. "I'm just going to stay home and drink hot chocolate," she said.