While school districts have instituted distance learning, snow days likely will survive. Just not on Friday.

School superintendents opted to stay with their schedules Friday, which brought the season's first snow, instead of canceling school or switching to distance learning. Just the same, they said bigger storms likely will lead to snow days.

Snow started to fall in southeastern Connecticut about 9 a.m. Friday, with temperatures at the Groton weather station dropping a few degrees below the lowest overnight temperature, to about 35 degrees, according to the National Weather Service. A mix of snow and rain fell steadily throughout the day.

Groton Superintendent Michael Graner said the state Board of Education recently voted that if there is a snow emergency, a school district can opt to shift for the day to full distance learning but it is not mandatory.

Graner said that's a great option to have, because then the district does not have to add on days at the end of the school year. While some districts automatically build snow days into their calendar, Groton does not.

On the other hand, Graner said with the exhausting hybrid learning format, there may be some value to taking a traditional snow day. He plans to discuss further with the school principals what to do if there is snow over the next few weeks.

Groton did not make any changes on Friday. Graner said he checked the temperature, and didn't think the roads would freeze up.

Lyme-Old Lyme students also were in school on Friday and have been doing fully in-learning schooling since September. Superintendent Ian Neviaser said the district wouldn't  bring back online learning for weather-related days off unless it has a significant number of snow days this winter.

"We believe enough has already been taken away from our kids due to the pandemic, we have no intention of taking away the joy of a snow day," he said.

When considering whether snow days should turn into online learning days, Neviaser said the emotional component was "a huge part of it."

"To me, it's one of the most important pieces," he said. "With the stress on everybody, but certainly on kids during this pandemic, we think it's important to keep things as normal as possible."

Peter Nero, North Stonington superintendent, said he received a notice this week from the Connecticut Association of Public School Superintendents about snow days during the pandemic. The decision of whether to go virtual on bad-weather days is being left up to the schools, Nero said. He said he'd discuss options with the Board of Education at its next meeting but plans to advocate for snow days to still exist. School was being held in-person on Friday.

If a snowstorm hits on a Wednesday, when the district does virtual learning, students still will be expected to log on, he said. But if a storm comes on another day of the week, the district likely will have a snow day.

"While I feel as though we could go virtual on a snow day, I'd like to get as many in-person school days as possible," Nero said, adding he'll hope to reschedule lost days of classes due to snow days. "We all feel as though we've missed enough in-person instruction days already."

He said if it's a bad winter and the district uses six or seven snow days, he'll consider going virtual after that point. And once schools return to all in-person learning, he said, the district will consider virtual learning on snow days now that it has a system for it.

Van Riley, Stonington superintendent, said his district plans “to pivot to distance learning on snow days.” Students who were scheduled for in-person classes on Friday were in school as planned.

Preston had a normal hybrid day on Friday, with roads wet but not snow-covered. Superintendent Roy Seitsinger said with the new state guidance, Preston is discussing a mix of potential virtual days and "old time" snow days, depending on the amount of weather days the district has used to date. The plan will be reviewed at the next Board of Education meeting Nov. 9.

Ledyard also held school in the normal hybrid format, as snow accumulated in yards and trees but not on the roads. Superintendent Jay Hartling said the district will be discussing the state's guidelines on how to address upcoming snow days.

New London schools, in the hybrid model, had a scheduled half-day since it was conducting parent-teacher conferences on Friday afternoon. The school day was not impacted by the weather.

Day Staff Writers Taylor Hartz, Claire Bessette, Kimberly Drelich and Greg Smith contributed to this report.