BCPS Delays Posting Dundalk High Opening Status on Website

Dundalk High School students may have been surprised as I was to learn that the school would open on time but, perhaps, for different reasons.

Baltimore County Public Schools announced, and Patch reported, last night on its website that the school would be closed due to power outages related to the remnants of Hurricane Sandy.

In fact, Dundalk High opened at its normally scheduled time.

All Baltimore County public schools were closed on Monday and Tuesday as a result of superstorm Sandy. Dundalk High was also closed on Wednesday because of a power outage.

School system spokesman Charles Herndon sent me an email at 8:46 a.m.—after school started—announcing the opening.

Herndon said he received the news that power had been restored at Dundalk High at around 8:30 p.m. He said that he personally updated the school system status call line shortly after to announce that Dundalk was now open.

However, when Patch reported the closure after 9 p.m. Wednesday, the school system had not updated the website. There was also no news release sent out to media announcing the change in status.

Mychael Dickerson, the school system's communications director, said the Department of Technology is responsible for updating the website, but could not explain the delay. He said Dundalk High's principal had sent out a phone message to families through the Connect-Ed notification system alerting them to the opening.

"This is why we have two, three measures in place to get the word out" he said.

Dickerson said the confusion did not cause attendance problems at Dundalk High.

"We haven't seen anything out of the ordinary," he said.