It is no secret that BASD Superintendent Dr. Joseph Roy gets comments thrown in his face on Twitter when snow is approaching. The night before, students from around the district constantly check Twitter for Roy’s famous “Bethlehem Area School District schools will be CLOSED” tweet. When Roy calls off, students happy and thank Roy on Twitter. However, when Roy declines on the day off and decides on a regular school day or sometimes even a two hour delay, things can get heated.

  “When I started on Twitter about five years ago, I never thought that the snow day tweets would generate such a response,” said Dr. Joseph Roy, via email interview.

  Roy tends to stay away from tweets directed to him when it relates to him not giving students a day off due to snow.

  “The tweets that praise the decision are fun. On the other hand, when we don’t have a delay or closure - sometimes people aren’t so nice with their tweets,” said Roy.

  This year, the weather was up and down. Flurries here and there, a bit of frozen rain, but nothing too major to give students a delay or the whole day off. However, on the evening of February 8, everything changed. Students and teachers had learned in advance that there was going to be a widespread snow storm across the east coast that brought about five to six inches of snow in parts of eastern Pennsylvania.

  Students across the district were anxiously waiting for that tweet they had been waiting all year for, and when Roy cancelled school for February 9, the praise rained down like crazy.

  The love for Roy was felt all over Twitter. So much that a Buzzfeed article was written on the topic. The article that came out on February 9 talked about the amazing tweets to Roy and showed its readers how long BASD students have been waiting for a snowstorm as well as a day off.

  No one could have thought that an event like this would lead to a hilarious article on Buzzfeed.

  “Overall our students are awesome and funny,” said Roy.