Richmond County Schools students will be able to make up the two days they lost to snow cancellations this week, and earn high marks on their exams, though it will mean the dreaded Saturday school day.

The two days of snow also happened to fall in the middle of exam week, meaning that high school students must not only attend school until noon Saturday, but take the midterm for their fourth block classes over the weekend.

The first block exam period was Friday, and students were scheduled to be back in school for second and third block exams Tuesday and Wednesday.

But that was before the snow.

Now those exam periods are scheduled for Thursday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., and the fourth block exam is scheduled to be administered Saturday from 8 a.m. to noon.

In addition to Richmond Senior High, the Richmond County Transitional School, Leak Street High School and the Ninth Grade Academy will be following the same schedule.

If students are exempt from their exams, they are not required to be at school on that day.

“We just want to recommend that students do get a good night’s sleep the night before taking an exam,” RCS Public Information Officer Ashley Simmons said. “Also, studies have shown that students perform better if they have something on their stomachs, so we encourage them to eat some type of breakfast on the morning of an exam.”

Breakfast and lunch will be provided at the schools on these days.

Simmons explained that the state of North Carolina requires 180 days of school in a given year, and the system has seven optional teacher workdays.

The board of education’s policy concerning cancellations for inclement weather is that, weather permitting, the day be made up on the following Saturday, Simmons explained. Because Friday was a scheduled teacher workday, the board decided to make up the two lost days on Friday and Saturday.