Same masking requirements at Cate. I can’t keep track anymore, but pretty sure indoor mask requirements are regional in California right now? Everyone here wears them indoors too.
They are sorting out Family Weekend, which is in a couple weeks. Parents can’t sit in on classes, and they moved parent teacher conferences to happen before FW via zoom.
Not sure what other FW changes are afoot. Fortunately a lot of things happen outside anyway.
Our rule is everyone, regardless of vaccination status, has to mask indoors except for while eating in dining halls. Masks are completely optional outdoors though. Right now we’re moving into “phase 2,” however—this might change in the next few weeks.
Mine said yesterday she hasn’t gotten hers yet 
Great news about no masks for the musical! Do you think things will continue to progress in the next few weeks or regress?? I’m not going to lie, the thought of parents weekend and having students go home for the long weekend makes me very nervous for the test results the following week!
As we look at schools for kiddo2, it’s interesting to see which schools currently have indoor mask requirements and which don’t. As mentioned above, CT BSs are mandated by the government, but Mass, RI, & NJ schools seem to be making the choice independently.
I think that’s why they’re having conferences in-person—that way whatever spread is possible is somewhat limited between just students and their parents. Anyways, given that there were very few positives even right after returning from summer break, I don’t think it’ll be too much of a problem—numbers are lower now than they were then.
They’ve already restored a lot of things—just now, a boarder friend of mine texted me that the make-your-own-omelette bar (which becomes make-your-own-stirfry/fried rice/noodles bar at night) is finally back, and dining returned to self-serve a few days ago. Hopefully, we can keep it up—I know there were two positives a few days back, but there doesn’t seem to be any discernible spread.
Also, I was under the impression that NJ schools were mandated by the government too: Office of the Governor | Governor Murphy Announces Indoor Mask Requirement for Beginning of 2021-2022 School Year
I was so happy to see the salad bar is back!!! Keeping my fingers crossed for an uneventful parent’s weekend covid-wise.
While NJ does have that mandate in place, in communication to parents, it has sounded like it’s up to Lville to make the decision on masks. When Murphy put the mask mandate in place before this school year started, Murray sent out an email stating they were still going to be mask optional indoors after phase zero. Of course, that didn’t happen, and now they are in phase two… I’d be interested to see what other NJ BSs are doing.
ETA: I suspect Lville would fall under the mandate’s “with limited exceptions” because they are a “fully” vaccinated community.
At our school there’s a points system. X points per year of teaching, Y for coaching, Z for previously living in dorms with students, etc. Then if/as housing comes up, you can use your points to try to swap into a different living situation. Honestly when they tried to explain it all to me my head sort of exploded.
I would have thought there was some seniority system but some very senior people live off campus completely (in different towns even in some cases) and others are still dorm parents in their 70s after being in school for decades. And some young relative new teachers have nice adjacent houses. Maybe having a bunch of little kids helps with that? But a lot of it may be personal preference as well.
We’ve been wearing masks since the first week of school in all indoor spaces except dorms. We had twice weekly testing the first fourteen days of school, and since then only unvaccinated or partially vaccinated students have been tested regularly. There’s a chance that the protocol will be changed this week into an indoor mask-optional policy (pending the results of Monday’s campus wide testing), which we’ve been told means that classroom masking is at the teacher’s discretion. Until children under 12 are approved for the vaccine, I think a lot of teachers will still ask us to wear them.
My kid went off-campus for a non BS team sports tournament two weeks ago (absent from campus Saturday night and all day Sunday ). School required two covid tests on return. One on the Sunday night and one on the following Wednesday.
Kiddo misinterpreted the instructions (probably didn’t listen/read!!) and only took the Sunday test, so now on the school report we can see two demerit points for ‘covid non-compliance’!!
School just administered flu shots and offered kids -1 demerit for taking the shot.
It’s good to hear that school is keeping track of the kids leaving campus and being more vigilant in testing them when they return to the BS bubble.
Oh, this takes me back…
Groton is still masking in ALL indoor space except a students own room. Students are not allowed in other dorms or other rooms within their own dorm. Students must mask in the common rooms of dorms. Parents are not allowed inside except for the AC for a game.
Groton is 100% vaccinated, there are no exemptions. Groton is testing everyone 1x a week and kids who go off campus get tested 2x a week.
As an aside, the breakthrough cases are coming to MA. Not at Groton but another BS in MA there is now a breakthrough case, badly managed.
Fwiw, I work in an office with not so many people, all vaxed, and we’ve had 2 breakthrough cases, both detected because of required travel testing. One was completely asymptomatic while the other felt a little under the weather but attributed it to the stress of preparing for their first big trip in ages. It’s a real thing…
For sure.
My assistant was out for two weeks in August, and now has some long covid symptoms that took her out for another week.
She is vaccinated with Pfizer, and she got it from her boyfriend, also vaccinated with Pfizer. He was also pretty sick. But they both count as mild cases because they didn’t require hospitalization.
I believe the few cases we’ve had are also breakthrough, though I’m not completely sure. I’m surprised about the dorm rules, though—here at Lawrenceville (which, having a large amount of day students and being located in a fairly crowded area, is a lot less “bubbly”) we can go to any dorm and anyone’s room within our own dorm at any time, as well as other dorms’ bedrooms during parietal hours.
The Groton headmaster is irrationally aiming for zero covid ever. Hence the overabundance of rules. They were only JUST allowed back in the dining hall, so cold food the first month + of school. Again despite a 100% vaccination rate.
Wow, that is really extreme. I know my kid had a period first ten days when they could not go visit other dorms and were supposed to wear masks in common areas of theirs (not at all enforced) but that was lifted quite quickly. And parents are allowed in the dorms though I think they are supposed to be masked. We shall see how parents weekend goes, most of the programming is supposed to be in outdoor tents but as always in late fall the weather is a big wild card. No parents in the classrooms.
This is literally never going to happen and is the kind of unreasonable goalpost setting that makes me insane. And I’m one of the most pro-science people you’d ever meet.
And that’s all I’ll say about that.
Well. If you could speak to the Groton headmaster about it I’d be eternally grateful. 
I agree with you 100%. Unfortunately, as I’ve noted before, there is no room for input.
A great read for those with kids applying to college this year. And a great read for the kids themselves!