On Tuesday, Kenyon woke up to a thick blanket of snow covering the Hill, along with a RAVE alert that all classes would be canceled for the day. Upon hearing this news, students sitting in parts of Dempsey Hall (New Side) erupted into cheers. Knox County had declared a Level 3 snow emergency, during which only emergency vehicles were authorized to be on roads. The notification stated that all employees should work from home and “obey snow emergency restrictions.” For students, this largely meant a morning free of classes. To celebrate the snowy merriment, many students sledded, while others participated in a snowball fight on Peirce Lawn. The alert was lifted at 1:01 p.m. via an announcement stating that “students should refer to direction from their faculty regarding classes being held this evening.” 

Peirce Hall remained open and operational. In an interview with the Collegian, Rochelle Arck, who is employed by AVI in workforce management, commented, “People are doing overtime. … They’re doing, like, a double shift. Some other people have come in … just to help out. You’re like our children. We would want someone to feed our children.”

In a message to the Collegian, Associate Provost for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Ted Mason, who has worked at Kenyon since 1989, spoke about times he remembered campus being closed for extreme winter weather: “To be honest, I do not remember when the last ‘snow day’ was. We have only had a very few of those in my time here. I do remember a while back when classes were canceled, not only because of snow, but because we were experiencing a polar vortex, so the temperatures were incredibly cold.”

The last time the College canceled classes for cold-weather-related reasons, but not snow, was in 2019, during the polar vortex that hit the Midwest. In an article about the 2019 vortex, the Collegian reported that addressing this situation included a shuttle, which ran between Peirce, the bookstore, Caples Hall, the Post Office and the Cox Health and Counseling Center. However, “many students chose to stay in their dorms for the duration of the day. … Some student employees were told on Wednesday that they didn’t have to come into work and various campus clubs and organizations either canceled their meetings or moved them to earlier in the day.” 

Prior to that event, during the vortex of 2014, the Collegian reported that “though news outlets were predicting temperatures below zero and wind chill in the negative double digits, seemingly everything but class was called off.” However, the article also mentioned that “students prepared for an event that hadn’t happened since the great ice storm of 2011 — a total College shutdown.” The Collegian reported on this 2011 ice storm, sharing that “Kenyon experienced a blackout. … Combined with an ice and sleet storm and a comparatively small snowstorm, Wednesday saw the cancellation of all classes and a mass migration of students to Peirce Hall, where natural light and packaged food provided warmth and sustenance.”

On the first snow day in decades, students got to witness a piece of Kenyon history for themselves. This being a snow day and not a polar vortex, though, they were able to enjoy fun winter activities without brutally cold weather.