Many schools in the eastern third of Nebraska, including Lincoln Public Schools, closed Wednesday and Thursday because of winter weather.

We sat down 1-on-1 with Lincoln Public School Superintendent Susan Gourley to find out what goes into the decision to cancel school.

"Well when we look at the weather and evaluated if we are going to close school we look at a combination of factors. We look at snow levels we look at wind factors we look at wind shield and we look at timing. We look at our arrival times and our dismissal times and the overriding factor for us is always student safety. We look at those factors and we make a decision based on our best judgment and again our first priority is always student safety."

"Instructional time is very important to us in Lincoln Public Schools. In our calendar we have more instructional time that is required by the state. We exceed the state minimum for instructional time but we can find ourselves being below the state required instructional time if we miss six or more days. We are currently on our fourth closure day so if we have to close a sixth day or possibly more days then we will have to make up some instructional time."

"Well we look at all the factors, obviously we look at snow, we look at ice, we look at temps and certainly here in Nebraska we always have to look at wind chill. We also have to look at winds and what direction they are coming at us so we look at a variety of factors. Again we take all those factors into consideration with our number one priority being student safety."