Minnesota school closings for Friday, Jan. 23, due to extreme cold

MINNEAPOLIS (FOX 9) - Several school districts in Minnesota plan to be closed or have e-learning days on Friday due to frigid temperatures and dangerously cold wind chills. 

An extreme cold warning goes into effect Thursday evening until Friday at noon. The warning will be followed by an extreme cold watch that will be in effect for the latter half of Friday through Saturday.

By 7 a.m. on Friday, the air temperature is expected to be around 19 degrees below zero, while the windchill could be 40 below zero. It doesn't get much better on Friday as the high temperature for the day in the Twin Cities isn't expected to exceed -8 degrees.

Minnesota school closings for Jan. 23

Local perspective:

Find a list of schools that are closing or are moving to e-learning on Friday below. If you're having trouble viewing the list, click here.

Note: Some school districts, including Minneapolis and Wayzata, already had Friday as a non-school day on their 2026 calendars for record keeping or teacher development days.

Dig deeper:

The last time every public school in the state was closed due to cold was during the polar vortex in January 2019. Then-Gov. Mark Dayton used emergency authority to close public schools statewide for multiple days due to life-threatening cold, with recorded wind chills on Jan. 30, 2019 at 50 to 60 degrees below zero across the state. Schools were closed from Jan. 27-31, 2019. 

Prior to that, Gov. Dayton closed schools due to cold on Jan. 6, 2014. And Then-Gov. Arne Carlson called off school on Jan. 18, 1994; Feb. 2, 1996; and Jan. 16, 1997, due to cold weather. 

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