The St. Elizabeth R-4 School District is keeping its schedule this week, even though the town has a boil order at least through today.
"We were given notice by the city (last) Friday night that we would, more than likely, not have water on Monday," Superintendent Toni Westbrooks-Taylor said, "So we were very proactive in that."
With the heads-up, she said, the school district contacted local stores, "but they couldn't get the water to us as quickly as we needed it."
Based on guidelines that say the district needs three bottles of water for each student, teacher and staff person each day, Westbrooks-Taylor said - and a need to cover two days - the St. Elizabeth district contacted the Jefferson City Walmart Supercenter at 724 W. Stadium Blvd.
"They were fabulous to work with" and had the 2,000 bottles the district calculated it needed.
"We pulled a school bus up on Sunday night, and Walmart helped us load up the 2,000 bottles of water - and we delivered it (Monday) morning," Westbrooks-Taylor said. "We had the kids put them in the classrooms, and then went on about our business."
St. Elizabeth town officials didn't respond to phone messages seeking a comment on the situation.
The state Natural Resources department said they didn't issue the boil order, and didn't have details on why the city did.