A letter about Spring Break travel plans |
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Dear Families,
Now that we’re getting close to Spring Break, we would like to take a few moments to discuss travel plans over the upcoming holiday.
If you are traveling during Spring Break, please read through this letter for instructions.
Our main concern is that families and our entire community stay safe and healthy during the holidays and after we return to campus.
With this in mind, we ask you to let Nurse Penny and/or Nurse Monica know if you’re traveling, where you’re going, and whether you’re driving or flying.
If you’re flying commercially, here are the updated guidelines from the CDC:
- If you are flying commercially, please get tested with a viral test 1-3 days before your trip. Please make sure you have the results of your negative test before you travel. Please keep a copy of your results with you during travel; you might be asked for them.
- Please do not travel if you test positive. Please isolate yourself immediately, and follow public health recommendations.
- Please get tested again with a viral test 3-5 days after flying commercially and stay home and self-quarantine for a full 7 days after travel, even if your test is negative. If you don’t get tested, please stay home and self-quarantine for 10 days after travel.
If you’re driving and are able to avoid contact with other people on your trip, and based on CDC guidelines, we would ask you to:
- Please contact the Nurses’ office to discuss your trip, so we can discuss whether getting tested is appropriate for your family.
- Please continue physical distancing, masking (with two masks, if you’re around others outside your family) and washing your hands often or using sanitizer.
- Please avoid crowds and stay at least 6 feet away from anyone who did not travel with you.
- If there are people in the household who did not travel with you, please wear a mask and ask everyone in the household to wear masks in shared spaces inside your home for 14 days after travel.
Reminders for travel in general from the CDC:
- Please avoid crowds and stay at least 6 feet/2 meters (about 2 arm lengths) from anyone who did not travel with you. It’s important to do this everywhere — both indoors and outdoors.
- Please wear a mask over your nose and mouth when in public settings. Masks are required on planes, buses, trains, and other forms of public transportation traveling into, within, or out of the United States and in U.S. transportation hubs such as airports and stations.
- If there are people in the household who did not travel with you, please wear a mask and ask everyone in the household to wear masks in shared spaces inside your home for 14 days after travel.
- Please wash your hands often or use hand sanitizer with at least 60% alcohol.
- Please avoid being around people who are at increased risk for severe illness.
- Please watch your health and beware of COVID-like symptoms.
- If you received the vaccine, it’s still important for you to continue wearing a mask, and maintain physical distancing. This is because you still may spread the virus, even if you have minimal or no symptoms.
The Keystone community has responded admirably over the past year to COVID. As a result, we have seen an extremely low rate of infection in our community, and up to now, there’s been no transmission within our school. Let’s continue the great work we have done up to now, so we can keep everyone in our community safe and healthy.
If you have any questions or concerns, please contact Nurse Penny or Nurse Monica.
We wish you a restful, healthy, and safe holiday.
With hope,
Billy
Billy Handmaker
Head of School
Monica Gutierrez, RN
School Nurse
Penny Moyer, LVN
School Nurse
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Fourth-grader's mask design wins citywide contest |
Congratulations to fourth-grader Isabella -- the mask she designed won a contest sponsored by Community First Health Plans.
She received the most votes in the Little Artists division, for young people from 7-12 years old.
Community First will make more than 1,000 masks and distribute them to Keystone, and to hand out to its customers. A physically distanced celebration will take place at the school in the coming weeks.
In addition to receiving credit for creating the mask design, Isabella will receive a custom award and a gift bag from Community First.
Way to go, Isa!
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Keystone's Academic World Quest wins for 10th year in a row |
Make it 10 years in a row for Keystone's dominance in Academic World Quest.
The senior team (from left) of Ethan, Ali, Anjali and Kaitlin kept the Keystone streak alive by winning the regional Academic World Quest competition hosted by the World Affairs Council of San Antonio, Mr. Spedding reports.
Keystone has won the regional competition each year since 2011 and will compete in a virtual national competition in late August. Our students also won a local lunch with two former US ambassadors to learn more about careers in foreign service.
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Little School holds Rodeo Day |
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This week brought Rodeo Day to the Little School, when students had a chance to ride a pony and play in a petting zoo.
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Registration opens next week for Keystone summer camps
Registration for summer programs at Keystone opens up next week. Here’s the lineup:
Camp Cobra - Coach Hawk will offer basketball and volleyball from June 1-4 on campus. Co-ed basketball will run from 9am-noon and co-ed volleyball runs from 1-4pm. Cost: $150 for either basketball or volleyball, $300 for both. Open to rising 3rd through 8th graders. Each camp has a hard limit of 28 campers.
Camp Hollywood - Learn the art of filmmaking with Mr. Ciaravino, Ms. Pantoja (Ms. G) and Ms. Letos. Camp June 7-11 and June 14-18. will lead these sessions. Open to rising 3rd through 8th graders. Cost: $300/week. This camp is limited at 21 students.
Little School Art & Science Camp: For Keystone students from 3-8 years old, the Little School is holding its camp from June 1-11. Each day runs 8am-2:45pm, with extended day care available. Cost is $585 for both weeks.
Online Math Enrichment: For rising Keystone 5th and 6th graders, Mr. Mustafa will offer virtual Math Enrichment for two weeks: June 28-July 1 and July 5-8. Cost for each two-week session is $162.50.
For all in-person camps, we will continue COVID precautions, including temperature and symptom checks, wearing masks, maintaining physical distancing, and eating lunches outside.
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Virtual Science Fair for Grades 3-8 coming March 3
From Dr. Wivagg:
We will start with a 30 minute program introducing the fair and then we will feature several students in grades 3-8, who will talk about the science fair process and how they worked to create their project. After, we will reveal a website to everybody that includes links to all of the students projects and presentations (recorded videoes) so that parents can explore the projects and comment on them.
Date: March 3rd 9:00 am
Who: Grades 3-6 and parents and friends are invited to attend virtually
Zoom link:
Meeting ID: 436 329 8528
Passcode: 119cobra
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Here's the schedule for picture retakes:
Saturday, March 6: All Little School students and students in distance mode. Photos will take place on the Main Campus. Watch for a Signup Genius link to reserve your spot.
Friday, March 29: Students on the Main Campus.
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Billy's Blog - From our Head of School |
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“We choose to go to the Moon...We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard;”
--President John F. Kennedy
Earlier this year at morning drop-off as we took temperatures and asked whether children were experiencing COVID like symptoms, a bespectacled student and I bemoaned the fact that in this day and age, we can send people to the moon and we can develop a vaccine in less than a year; however, we still cannot figure out how to prevent eyeglasses from fogging while wearing a mask.
I pondered this juxtaposition between our human capacity to accomplish great things while still facing difficult hurdles last week during the snow and ice storm. On the same day that our house finally seemed to have recovered electricity and water, the news featured a moving clip of NASA landing a robotic rover on Mars. Watching the engineers cheer and clap as years of hard work, determination, and dedication came to fruition provided an inspirational moment. It felt perfectly fitting that the rover is named Perseverance.
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Important events and notes |
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UT's Girl Day for STEM ends this weekend |
This is the final weekend of Girl Day at the University of Texas at Austin.
In this event, students from K-8th Grades can learn more about STEM and STEM fields. It ends March 1.
Even though it's called Girl Day, it's open to boys, too.
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Keystone gear available at Vivroux Sports |
Get your Keystone gear with a quick visit to Vivroux Sports.
On their retail floor, they have:
- White and Black Adidas hats
- White Comfort Color t-shirts in all sizes adult and youth
- Adidas grey and white t-shirts some youth and adult sizes
- Cardinal and black full and 1/4 zip Adidas jackets in select adult sizes
- And a few Adidas black polos
Vivroux Sports is open 10am-5pm Monday-Friday, at 2222 Breezewood, just off New Braunfels Ave. north of the McNay Museum.
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Plan your hot lunch schedule |
Due to the winter storm last week, Cafeteria Services has changed its menu for the first week of March.
For more information, including how to load your account go to:
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Support Keystone while you shop |
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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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Follow Keystone on social media |
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