Note to the Keystone Community: We will continue to publish the Communiqué every two weeks during the summer. Look for the next issue on July 3.
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Congratulations to the Class of 2020
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The Class of 2020 graduated on a beautiful morning in an outdoor ceremony at the Little School — with appropriate physical distancing, of course. The event itself was limited to the graduates, up to five guests per student and some Keystone staff members, but an additional 421 people watched the event via livestream.
As part of the graduation celebration, Keystone compiled advice and encouragement from alumni to the Class of 2020 from Keystone grads from as far back as 1970. Watch the
the video from alumni here.
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A message from Mr. Handmaker
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Dear Parents,
I am happy and proud to announce that the board of the Independent Schools Association of the Southwest (ISAS) voted to re-accredit Keystone for another ten years. This vote of confidence is directly attributable to the dedication and excellent work of our entire faculty and staff, and to your unwavering support. It is truly an honor to lead a team that continually keeps its focus on our school’s mission.
I also would like to update you on our planning for next year. Please know that I understand how frustrating it can be to not have definite answers right now. I wish I could tell you now what we will do come August; we will not know until sometime in mid-July when we have a better understanding of the status of COVID-19 in San Antonio.
Meanwhile, Keystone’s Safety Committee continues to meet daily and work with Division Heads to plan for a variety of scenarios ranging from our being together on campus with physical distancing modifications in place, to a form of hybrid learning where some students are on campus and some are attending remotely from home on different days, to a return to distance learning.
As of right now, here’s what we know:
- We will start school in person on August 19 if we believe we can do it safely. We will rely on medical advice as well as state and local directives.
- Throughout the school year, we will hold classes on campus only if local medical conditions allow.
- We have created a Medical Advisory Committee composed of physicians and medical experts from a variety of fields that will help us in our decision making process.
- We are making modifications to classrooms on both campuses, using some non-teaching places as classrooms (such as the cafeteria in Founders Hall), and one space off campus across the street from school for upper school students. With these changes, we will be able to accommodate all students within the six-foot physical distance requirements.
- In some of these classroom modifications to accommodate physical distancing, teacher desks, bookshelves and student lockers will be removed to create more space and reduce traffic.
- We are creating outdoor teaching spaces with waterproof coverings in areas such as the Theatre Courtyard and the Quad.
- We are designating stairways as one-way to reduce traffic and physical proximity.
- We are installing hand sanitizing stations on both campuses.
- Every morning, every person who enters either campus will have their temperature taken. Nobody will be allowed on campus with a fever of 100o or more. We have devised morning drop off and after school pick up procedures that reduce the number of people on campus or the potential for gathering in large groups. We will also curtail significantly the number of people who come on campus.
- We are continuing to study the efficacy of everyone wearing masks while taking into consideration the impact of children and adults not seeing each other’s faces and facial expressions.
- The Heads of the Little, Lower, Middle and Upper Schools are making changes in their respective divisions and are sharing those changes in video messages to parents.
- We are increasing bandwidth on campus, purchasing technology, and modifying classrooms to allow for both in-person and distance learning simultaneously or separately.
As you can see, we are making many changes to prepare for whatever may come. We will keep you informed as our planning continues and we learn more.
With gratitude,
Billy
William B. Handmaker
Head of School
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Keystone parent shares story of racial profiling
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Mr. Steward, an alumnus of San Antonio Academy, Deerfield Academy and Duke University, spoke of his experiences, such as how as a young man, he was the only one stopped and questioned by Alamo Heights police despite being with other white kids.
He's also the husband of third-grade teacher Mrs. Steward and the dad of
rising Kindergarten student Grace
.
If you haven't read his story and that of others, it's eye-opening.
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Former Keystone student releases new album
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Congratulations to former Keystone student Franco, on the release of his latest music collection.
Better known by his performing name, Z-Ray, Franco just released his latest music collection, “For the Metro, Vol. 1.”
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Keystone community responding to pandemic
Members of the Keystone community are living out the school's pillars of Community Involvement and Responsible Leadership by launching or supporting fundraisers to help organizations involved in the pandemic. We'll include them on the Keystone website at:
https://www.keystoneschool.org/covid-19-resources
. Click on the "fundraising efforts" tab.
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Important Events and Notes
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Support Keystone while you shop
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If you're getting school supplies or adding to your home office from either
Office Max or Office Depot
, please mention Keystone. As part of the
Give Back to Schools program
, the stores give 5% of the purchase price of
qualifying school supplies
in credits to Keystone for office supplies. Be sure to include the school's ID number when you make your purchase. Keystone's school number is: 70100727.
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If you're purchasing items from Amazon, please consider supporting Keystone with your purchases and use
AmazonSmile.
Just designate Keystone as the beneficiary and a portion of your purchases will go to the school.
Make sure to install the Smilematic browser extension. It works with Firefox, Chrome and Safari and automatically redirects users to AmazonSmile when they visit Amazon. Here's the tool:
https://couponfollow.com/smilematic.
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We want to hear from you!
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If you have news to share about the students, alumni, faculty or staff at Keystone School, please send it to:
etijerina@keystoneschool.org
.
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Follow Keystone on social media
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