Lafourche Parish closes schools ‘until further notice’

Lafourche Parish Public Schools spokesman Floyd Benoit confirmed Monday afternoon that the parish’s public schools would remain closed “until further notice” after Hurricane Isaac.

The school system originally planned to resume yesterday. They had to extend class cancellation after approximately 10 schools in the system still didn’t have electricity on Monday morning.

“Those schools have been without power for a week,” Benoit said. “So it’s humid. It’s hot. It’s wet. Everything just needs to be cleaned up and mopped, and we need to get the air conditions up … just things like that.”

Benoit said he spoke with Entergy and was told that all schools could have power in the near future.

“We’re being told it might even be today,” he said on Monday.

But even with power restored, Benoit said the parish would “need a few days” to get everything in working order before allowing classes to continue.

He said administrators would need to assess equipment to make sure that it returned to working order.

“Clean-up could take two-to-three days,” Benoit said. “It just depends. People never think of this kind of stuff, but just because the electricity returns, when things power up, we need to make sure the air conditioners work, the sewer plants work and the freezers work – just things like that. Because without all of those things working, guess what? There’s still no school. We can’t have 600 kids coming to school if there’s no working facilities.”

Benoit said aside from electricity issues, Lafourche’s schools fared well in Isaac.

The spokesman said Golden Meadow Upper Elementary had minor roof damage due to high winds in the area.

“They had a few roof panels missing,” Benoit said. “It was minor. Overall, we fared pretty well.”

Once back in the classroom, Lafourche students will need to make up for missed time.

Benoit said the parish has the ability to miss three full days of school without having to utilize make-up days.

But because the lay-off surpassed three days, time will need to be made up elsewhere.

Benoit said officials would explore turning planned half days into full days and also possibly shortening holiday breaks to cover the gaps.

Weekend class was not an option he presented when asked about how time would be made up.

Visit www.tri-parishtimes.com or www.facebook.com/triparishtimes for further updates about when Lafourche schools will resume classes.