Welcome to Good News!
Highlighting Achievements and Successes at
the Texas School for the Deaf.

Volume 5, Issue 3

TSD Rangers are STATE CHAMPIONS!

What a remarkable ending to a football season that almost never happened. Due to a limited roster as a result of COVID-19, the TSD Rangers scaled back and played 6-man football this season. What a journey it was, though, as they went all the way to State!

The football team, led by Coach John Moore, played with gusto and blew Veritas Academy out of the water with a score 63 to 32 to win the state championship title. The Rangers came out strong in the first quarter and dominated throughout the game.

It had been 63 years since the last time the TSD Rangers went to the state finals, and the first time in history they reach the championship.

Congratulations to the 2020 Rangers football team! A successful and healthy Fall season!

Santa Claus is full of magic. Not even a pandemic could keep Ol' Saint Nick from his special mission: getting to visit with the Deaf and hard of hearing children in Central Texas at the annual Signing Santa event at Barton Creek Square Mall.

Kids who came to visit Santa posed for a photo and took home a small gift brought directly from his North Pole workshop.

Special thanks to North Austin Optimists Club for sponsoring this event.

Continuing with our priority of keeping our students and staff healthy and safe, our TSD Health Center has been extra busy these past few days administering our BinaxNOW COVID rapid tests.

After the Thanksgiving break, the Health Center lead a group of staff and volunteers in COVID-19 testing for on-campus learners. TSD appreciates all of our frontline heroes!

Introducing the Original 8 (O8) Newscast members: Yamila, Rosalia, Alyssa, Zarek, Saul, Kylar, Jayne, and Tobie.

As part of the Graphic Design and Video Production course requirements, each cast member experienced different roles on the news team. This opportunity allowed the students to become experts in collaborating, communicating, and coordinating the entire news process.

O8's number one priority is to keep their audience engaged each week. They carefully select topics everyone can relate to, such as life hacks and self-care.

The name Original 8 was inspired by a popular slang term, OG refers to someone who is incredibly exceptional, authentic, and "old-school."

Catch their latest broadcast on the CTE Instagram page HERE.

Congratulations to our Family Signs Graduates!

Four families graduated this semester from Family Signs, a free online sign language instruction program through TSD's Statewide Outreach Center (S.O.C.).

Congratulations!!!

A holiday message from our superintendent

On Opening Day this fall I reminded you that our most important school supplies this year were patience, hope, empathy, flexibility  and resilience.  And so, it has been the case.  50% of our families chose to send their students to in-person classes while the remainder chose virtual learning from home and we all rose to the challenge with personal and professional sacrifices to make it work.

This has been an extraordinary time with extraordinary stress.  With that stress came extraordinary opportunity.  Bene Brown says, “Sometimes the bravest and most important thing you can do is just show up.”  Thank you to each of you for showing up.

Happily, a vaccine is around the corner, but it will take time to reach all of us in our individual priority groups.  With these rising case numbers, we are still very vulnerable—so let’s complete this difficult 2020 by staying faithful to the things we know are critical to living in this pandemic—stay close to home, limit your social interactions,  wear your mask, practice social distancing  and be vigilant with your health and hygiene protocols

I wish you all a happy and healthy holiday season.  May you find joy in your well-deserved holiday break and confidence in the future we will build together in 2021.

Warmest regards,

Claire Bugen