Battle For Bascom Preview
Quick preview of the epic Battle for Bascom, Wednesday, December 9, 2009.
http://http://vimeo.com/8092942
Lakeshore and Southeast go head to head on UW’s first snow day in almost 30 years.
http://http://vimeo.com/8129628
A snow day for the record books…
The University of Wisconsin-Madison canceled a full day of classes for the first time in more than 30 years. The announcement came around 7:45 p.m. the night before, prompting students to celebrate in true UW fashion. The day off came right before finals week, allowing many the opportunity to have extra time to study.
Due to extreme blizzard conditions, the University of Wisconsin System closed all universities except UW-Superior.
Most of the UW System campuses — including UW-Madison, UW-Eau Claire and UW-Whitewater — were closed. Classes were canceled for the whole day, and non-essential employees were asked not to report to work.
According to a statement from UW spokesperson David Giroux, UW-Superior and UW-Milwaukee were still open Wednesday morning.
However, after consulting with the university’s weather service, Chancellor Carlos Santiago decided to cancel classes and close the UW-Milwaukee campus effective 1 p.m., according to the UW-Milwaukee website, making UW-Superior the only campus of the UW System with no closure or class cancellation.
“The campus has been open all day and classes are not canceled,” said Al Miller, spokesperson for UW-Superior. “UW-Superior is at the border of Minnesota, and we don’t have a great deal of snow here.”
He added though he did not have much chance to talk to students so far, he knew there were some who were disappointed there were no cancellations for the day.
“But it stopped snowing in the middle of the day, so overall, the snow is not really having a significant impact to the operations of the campus today,” Miller said.
UW-Madison spokesperson John Lucas said having a full-day cancellation of classes is a fairly unusual occurrence.
December 1990 was the last time a large portion of a day’s classes was cancelled due to snow, Lucas said.
“The (UW-Madison) chancellor said safety was really important, and she was thinking about how not only students but also faculty could get to campus today, and so she decided to prioritize safety as the main objective and keep people from danger,” Lucas said.
He added many operations had also been canceled, and many campus services — with the exception of RecSports and the Student Activity Center — were closed.
Other campuses, including UW-La Crosse, UW-Parkside and UW-Green Bay, also canceled classes due to the blizzard. Arrangements concerning campus services and staff at different campuses might have had slight differences, but in general, the same conditions applied with non-essential staff being asked to stay at home, while essential services continued.
