Due to winter weather conditions on area roads, all classes will be virtual Thursday, Feb. 11 for remote and in-person students.

“Rather than canceling school for a day and requiring the use of a designated make-up day, we will offer virtual learning, which will allow us to continue forward with our teaching and learning while preserving the bad weather make-up days as student and staff holidays,” Principal Jeremy Gilbert said in a district email.

Students and teachers are expected to follow their regular eight-period daily schedule that is in place during hybrid and virtual learning each day.

Students will be required to login to their Google Classroom and Google Meet at the start of each class period. Teachers will plan for synchronous and asynchronous activities for our students, and they will take attendance at the start of each period, just as they would during a regular school day

However, many other school districts in the DFW area that offer virtual learning have canceled classes completely. Districts such as Allen ISD, Arlington ISD, Cedar Hill ISD, Duncanville ISD, Garland ISD and Plano decided to use one of the two allotted bad weather days.

“As students, especially seniors, we have had so much taken away from us this year, and now we don’t even have a snow day,” senior Anna Gregory said. “With other schools in the DFW area having canceled classes, I think it is only fair if our school is canceled too.”

However, HPISD was not completely alone in this decision. Dallas ISD and Fort Worth ISD also made the decision to hold remote classes today. Frisco ISD did not cancel class at all and attended in-person.

The hazardous road conditions across the metroplex have proved to be deadly. At least five people died in a pileup involving more than 100 cars on I-35W in Fort Worth, and people were left trapped in cars. First responders are still working on clearing the scene, as of 1 p.m.