
Coinciding with the scheduled return to school on January 7, 2025, a snowstorm swept across the country with Mercersburg in its direct path. Additionally, just before the snowstorm’s arrival, the town of Mercersburg experienced a serious power outage that took out power and water for days in different buildings on campus. As a result, students, faculty, and staff had to adjust to the unforeseen weather conditions.
“One of the hardest parts of this snowstorm is that it comes the day after we just had a massive power outage that took out many of the electrical systems across campus,” said Head of School, Quentin McDowell.
Andy Brown, the Dean of Students, explained that the power outage resulted from an issue with the “electrical source off-campus.”
“Unfortunately, that had some consequences as far as sending too much voltage through the lines, which impacted some of our systems on campus and our off-campus housing for faculty. So we had some faculty members without heat or briefly without water,” Brown noted.
Leah Long ‘96, Latin and Art History teacher living in faculty housing, said, “We got really lucky and didn’t have any electricity or heat problems.” Unfortunately, this was not the case for all.
For students, the main challenge was returning to campus safely, as many flights, both nationally and internationally, were delayed or canceled due to the heavy snow.
According to Lena Wilke ’27, “I had to fly back to school on Sunday, even though classes started on Tuesday, because my flight got canceled for Monday. We thought the other flight on Tuesday would be canceled, so I woke up at 3:30 in the morning on Sunday, which was literally awful. There was no other flight, all because of the snowstorm, and it didn’t even snow that much.”
Similarly, Eric Cittadine ’26 said, “My flight got canceled, so I came a little bit late, and I missed classes.”
Other students who had to travel internationally, like Luana Colell Navarro ’27, said, “Because of the snowstorm, I stayed in Spain for three days. My flight got canceled. I just got here on Thursday. My schedule changed a lot because of it too.”
McDowell recognized the challenges: “I think anytime you have a weather event, there are so many things that go into planning for that. This particular weather event happened to coincide with the return to school, so it becomes much more complicated, meaning that we have to think about transportation, making rearrangements, and trying to open dorms early for those who try to get here before the storm starts.”
Even though the situation was complicated, the school was able to make transportation arrangements to assist. Brown said, “I was very thankful for Ms. Ecton and everyone in our office for assisting in student arrivals based on any delays or cancellations due to the flights and changes caused by the weather.”
Apart from transportation obstacles, the power outage that shut down Irvine Hall—where math, science, and language classes take place—also prompted changes in the school schedule. Classes had to be relocated to spaces ranging from the Irvine Memorial Chapel classroom to the Aquatic Center classroom.
“I had to walk in the cold at 8:40 in the morning in 16-degree weather to the pool. I had to do honors chemistry class in the lobby of the Aquatic Center, which was really odd. Very weird learning environment. The Irvine shutdown had a really big impact, making me walk extra distances in the cold weather,” Wilke said.
Reflecting on the decision, McDowell said, “You only have your own perspective, so I think you make the best decision you can in the moment with the information you have. It's easy to look back and say, ‘Oh, you know, we could have delayed the start of school. We could have been a bit more flexible with the schedule.’”
Wilke agreed: “There's not much they could do about the weather. There's not much they could do about Irvine shutting down. When it comes to classes, I feel like Tuesday should have been a half-day, or classes should have started on Wednesday. Because so many people weren’t here, I would have traveled on Tuesday if there were no classes or if it was a half-day. I just didn’t want to miss a whole day of classes. They should have done better scheduling.”
The main reason Mercersburg Academy kept its original schedule, according to McDowell, “was to create some normalcy, to have kids back in the class, and get them to do the normal things that we do at school. Therefore, we didn’t just have a bunch of students who came back and then had to sit around waiting for school to restart. I’m happy with the way we approached this particular storm, given all the circumstances. We’ll always stop and say, ‘How can we approach things differently?’”
Despite various difficulties, students could walk on safe, snow-free roads, attend their lessons, and enjoy the new dining hall food. A large part of that effort was attributed to the academy’s staff.
“We have a fantastic building and grounds crew that keeps all the paths and roads clear and safe for us,” Brown said.
“All of our snow crew are here at 5:30 or 6 o’clock in the morning to start plowing roads, salting, and doing all the things they need to do. They even prepared the campus before the weekend started, knowing the snow was coming. But the weather can be really hard to navigate, right? I guess it’s really unpredictable,” McDowell stated.
Mercersburg Academy’s new catering company, FLIK Independent School Dining, according to Brown, “was able to make all this change in the midst of a snowstorm. We were super thankful for FLIK.”
Reflecting on these events, McDowell said, “I’m always grateful to our community when we have something external that disrupts or interrupts the flow of our community and school day, whether it's a power outage or a snowstorm. I'm always amazed and impressed at how well our students and our adults adjust and try to make the best of it. And I think that’s really what life looks like, right? Making the best out of difficult situations.”