September 21, 2021
Good afternoon, Blacksmith Family,
We have recently received notification that the Texas Education Agency (TEA) has changed its public health directives. During a recent call with Commissioner Mike Morath, schools learned that TEA rescinded a portion of the August 19th Public Health Guidance document and has now directed all public schools to comply with Governor Abbott’s order GA-38. As you will recall, GA-38 states that school systems cannot require students or staff to wear masks.
We understand that this will concern some of our parents. We will continue to monitor our case counts and encourage hand washing/sanitizing efforts on campus along with other measures to help promote healthy conditions for our school. We also continue to highly encourage students and staff to wear masks on campus should you choose to exercise this option; however, we will not require the use of a face mask as of Wednesday, September 22, 2021.
To help us promote health and attendance for students we also ask that you DO NOT SEND YOUR CHILD TO SCHOOL IF THEY ARE SICK. We have had to send several students home this week who have come to school sick. We ask you all to be mindful of the safety of other students and staff and keep your child home if they’re experiencing a fever, cough, headaches, and other cold, flu, and COVID-like symptoms. We still face the real possibility of closing a portion or all of our campus should we have a widespread breakout of illness.
As information changes, we will continue to provide you updates. As always, thank you for your support.
Sincerely,
Amanda DeGan
Westlake Academy Superintendent
