<p>Schools here have lost their April break but they’re taking the February one. Guess everyone will have to cancel their Carnival cruise reservations… :(</p>
<p>The schools in our town in CT were open on Veterans Day, Martin Luther King Day and will be open on Monday. This is to help make up the lost days from Sandy and the snow days in Jan. and Feb. They will then schedule any make up days until the end of June. They are trying to preserve Spring break.</p>
<p>I just heard that the NewHaven area is getting 2-5 more inches of [totally unwanted] snow over the next day or so.</p>
<p>“Is it customary for many school districts to get a winter and spring break? We only get spring break.”</p>
<p>Growing up in New Haven we never had a Feb break. When we moved to Syracuse in the late 60’s they had a break in Feb. The reasoning was that it was such a long winter and a lot of parents were pulling their kids out of school to get away so it just made sense to have a break in Feb. No idea when the rest of NE started doing the same but it’s pretty much all of the northeast now.</p>
<p>We didn’t have a Feb break growing up in NJ, but my kids had that week and then the April week. but in the past few years (going back to when the younger was in HS) they scaled back to usually a 4 day break (fri and monday off). Yesterday, H had a half day and he has Monday off (though he’s already figuring out how to get into the school to set up labs…) </p>
<p>I always thought the full week was crazy. We never went away; it just meant babysitting logistics I didn’t need.)</p>
<p>In Vt we have a Dec-Jan break, a late feb break and a late April break. it was great for us, but I can understand that it might not be great for every family.</p>
<p>Looking for the “Like” button, stradmom. Lol</p>
<p>The bottom line is that education next week in New Haven will be very low quality. Students are receiving emails from teachers saying, “I’ll be gone. Here’s your work.” A sub–particularly for an AP class–won’t have a clue. It’s all about the 180 day state funding requirement, and about the upcoming Connecticut standardized tests that are used for school/teacher evaluations. </p>
<p>My son, and his friends, would prefer to lose April break, which would allow more AP prep–something they see as more relevant to their educational lives.</p>
<p>Wow, my sister just found out that her homeowners insurance company is dropping her–not for claims she has filed, but because she lives in a “high risk” area. She is in southern Mass. “within 3 miles” of the coast–that’s the reason.</p>
<p>Every insurance company she has called has said they are not covering people in her area–so she needs to call the Mass. Insurance Commission to find out what companies will insure her. She has a month to find new insurance!</p>
<p>It never dawned on me that a company could just drop you at will.</p>
<p>I just realized someone might wonder why I posted in this thread!! I think Hurricane Irene and Sandy and then this last huge winter storm Nemo (sister lost power for 2 days) is the reason–so sort of related!!</p>
<p>MA has had insurance issues for the last two decades but most of the problems have been with automobile insurance companies, many which have left the state.</p>
<p>Our homeowner insurance company left the state back in the early 1990s - it might have had something to do with roof issues or mold - don’t remember - but companies can leave the state or drop coverage for those that they feel are bad risks. We looked into other companies and the lowest we could find was 2.5 times the cost of our old insurance company.</p>
<p>martharap --</p>
<p>Same thing happened to homeowners in Florida after it was hit with one hurricane after another.</p>
<p>The main problem - which is the same in FL and other states with windstorms - is just that: windstorm coverage can be catastrophic and insurers can’t get cheap enough reinsurance for that coverage to make it worthwhile to offer. So states like MA - and FL, etc. - have state run insurance programs. In MA, it’s the MPIUA. They have a website: mpiua.com. They’re very nice though of course somewhat overwhelmed, being staffed at state levels instead of private company customer service levels. </p>
<p>A 2nd problem in MA and some other states is that for a while the value of homes rose above what the insurers would cover. We ran into this problem. Most people, because they rarely update the values on their policies, tend to be under-insured unless they have a straight forward replacement cost policy. Those are more expensive than one with a limit and many replacement cost policies have limits built in that essentially impose a dollar limit without strictly listing one. When we had our house reassessed, we found only 2 insurers would even cover it because of value limits. And neither of them would cover us because of our old barn. They wouldn’t even exclude it from coverage, which really ticked me off. And they were many times the cost of our old policy - one was 3x more. So it was MPIUA for us. They did exclude the barn. The coverage was reasonably priced and we never had a claim so it was never an issue. After a few years, all the insurers raised their value limits and also allowed us to exclude the barn, so the problem went away. </p>
<p>So it’s MPIUA, the Massachusetts Property Insurance Underwriting Association. It’s a pool run essentially by the state to which all insurers have to contribute. It’s generally called the FAIR Plan, for the law - both federal and state - for fair access to insurance requirements.</p>
<p>I’ve been waiting for insurance rates to go up.</p>
<p>2400 tickets written for the storm and uts aftermath. story was in the Globe</p>
<p>They’re calling the 4-6 inches we are supposed to get tomorrow “heart attack” snow.</p>
<p>Be careful out there, people. 
</p>
<p>We had over a foot of the heavy, wet snow last storm. This should be easy.</p>
<p>Boston area people, what are the chances of a flight out tomorrow at 1:00pm? I rebooked my daughter’s flight for Saturday, but she really wants to fly out tomorrow. My guess is it’s not going to happen.</p>
<p>I have to laugh that in Washington DC they basically shut down the whole city, and then they wound up getting virtually nothing.</p>
<p>Oops!</p>
<p>It’s risky to cancel things too far in advance of a snowstorm, half the time the forecast winds up being completely wrong.</p>
<p>The forecast for Boston is down to 1-3", and many places along the coast will get nothing but rain. I doubt the airport will be significantly impacted by this storm, but who knows.</p>