On Sunday afternoon, as light snow continued to fall throughout New England and hundreds of Tufts students were sledding and playing in the snow, Tufts officials were on the verge of making a very tough decision.
University administrators and facilities workers, in conjunction with the Medford Police Department, began working to clear the sidewalks, roads and building entrances in an attempt to allow classes to meet as usual on Monday. The problem, however, went beyond the limits of Tufts' Medford campus.
The snowstorm, dubbed the "Blizzard of 2005" by news channels throughout New England, dumped nearly two feet of snow on Boston. Residents north of the city and on Cape Cod were buried under almost three feet of snow by the time the skies finally cleared.
"We took into account the safety of our faculty and staff who have to drive here from off campus, as well as the commuting students," said University Vice President of Operations John Roberto.
"We want to make every effort to stay open," he said. "But we have to use extra caution with so many cars."
Roberto spoke not only with snow-removal workers at Tufts, but also with local police departments and city officials. On Sunday afternoon, state workers had many hours of work ahead of them in order to clear the local major highways in time for the Monday morning commute.
By late afternoon Sunday, Somerville and Boston had declared snow emergencies, which prohibit parking along the narrow city streets so that snowplows can move unimpeded. The City of Boston had already canceled all public school classes for the next two days.
After talking with the local cities and snow-removal crews, University administrators decided that classes should be suspended on Monday so as to not compromise the safety of students walking between classes as well as that of the faculty, staff and students who commute to campus every day.
"We wanted to err on the side of safety," Roberto said. "We made the call in the middle of the storm, about seven or eight p.m. on Sunday."
The announcement was immediately posted on Tuftslife.com.
Some members of the Tufts community, however, feel that a school-wide e-mail would have been a more appropriate method of disseminating the cancellation information. "I don't think [spreading the word to students and faculty] was done well enough," said Valerie Anishchenkova, a lecturer in the German, Russian and Asian Languages department.
Last weekend's storm was the first official blizzard to hit New England since the "April Fool's Storm" that struck on April 1, 2001. According to the National Weather Service, a blizzard involves heavy snow, winds in excess of 35 miles per hour, and visibility of less than one-quarter mile, sustained for more than three hours.
