Maryland schools won’t have to stay open past June 18, despite this winter’s wonky weather.

The state board of education decided Tuesday to give school districts a reprieve, along with a warning: Plan better for next time.

This year’s massive snowstorm — which shuttered many schools for an entire week — created chaos for districts that didn’t build enough snow days into their calendars. Maryland campuses are legally required to operate for at least 180 days.

Without intervention from the state board, Montgomery, Prince George’s and Harford counties would have had to push school into the week of June 22 to make up for lost time.

But ending school that late is an unpopular and expensive ordeal. Attendance dips once classes blow past the originally scheduled last day. Families may have already planned vacations or enrolled children in summer camps. Plus, state testing is far in the rearview.

State board of education members decided they weren’t going to make districts deal with that headache.

The board waived the requirement that students be in school for 180 days for Montgomery, Harford and Prince George’s counties, allowing those schools to end by June 18, right before the Juneteenth holiday and the primary election the following week. Caroline, Dorchester and Frederick counties also received one-day waivers that allowed for different calendar adjustments.

However, the school board denied waiver requests for Somerset and Washington counties because they had not extended the school year to June 18. The board considered whether school systems had made a good-faith effort to add days to the calendar before asking for a waiver.

The board told school leaders they need to plan better for future snow days.

State board president Josh Michael said the community wants more consistency in school calendars across the state. The board will consider passing regulations and may encourage the Maryland General Assembly to look at legislative solutions. The current regulations have not been reviewed since the pandemic, when virtual learning became commonplace.

Moving forward, districts should not design calendars that could allow classes to extend past Juneteenth, and should instead include options for makeup time during the spring semester.

Board members encouraged districts to pick one of two options: three built-in snow days plus a plan for virtual learning, or six snow days, all scheduled before the observed Juneteenth National Independence Day holiday.

They also tasked the state superintendent with issuing guidance on how to design better calendars.

Prince George’s school leaders previously told families that if a state waiver is granted, they will extend the school day by five minutes from April 7 through June 18. They will use March 27, April 22 and June 18 as full school days instead of early-release days.

Montgomery County officials told families to plan for full school days on June 15, June 16 and June 17, plus an early release day on June 18.

“Our goal is to make learning time meaningful and we know that extending late into June would lose much of that meaning,” they wrote in a Tuesday message.

The Montgomery school board is expected to discuss Thursday a virtual learning plan for some future snow days.

“MCPS is focused on being more proactive in our approach to addressing contingency plans for emergency closures for the 2026-2027 school year,” Superintendent Thomas Taylor wrote in a letter to state officials.