Head of School Weekly Email: Travel Guidance & Holiday/Winter Planning
October 23, 2020
Dear TA Families & Students,
Today marks the end of our 7th week of the school year. All things considered, the fall semester at TA has gone relatively smoothly thus far. We continue to welcome the 75% of our student body who are choosing to study on campus each day, and we are grateful to have had no cases of COVID to date. I want to thank each of you in the TA community for helping us arrive at this milestone.
As COVID cases rise around the country and in our region, it is important that we hold steady with the many precautions we have in place to maintain a safe and healthy school. This will be especially challenging during the holidays, as we are forced to alter some of the beloved gatherings, travel, and traditions we are used to.
We know you are hearing this from all sides – and apologize for the redundancy – but it’s essential for us to communicate this message from the school perspective: The risks associated with traveling to see family and friends and hosting friends and family from out of town are high and will continue to be through the holiday season. Your compliance with Vermont state travel guidance is a commitment you are making to help all of us at TA stay healthy and safe.
Here are a few key tips and links:
- Traveling outside of Vermont to yellow or red counties in neighboring states for anything but essential travel is restricted and requires a 7- or 14-day quarantine upon return to Vermont. Currently this even includes our neighbors across the river in Grafton County! (Read our post about this last week when the travel advisory first went into effect.)
- This essential resource regarding travel guidance for Vermonters is updated weekly on Tuesdays: https://accd.vermont.gov/covid-19/restart/cross-state-travel.
- Thank you to our Safety Committee and COVID Coordinator Sue Farrell for creating a user-friendly guide on all of this for the TA community.
Turns out this COVID race we are running is no sprint. Let’s take some pointers from our champion cross-country teams and continue to pace ourselves steadily for the miles and climbs ahead.
Take care,
Carrie Brennan, Head of School