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February 7, 2020

Westlake Reflections

MESSAGE FROM PRINCIPAL RAMSEY

Seussical the Musical………..

Sometimes simple messages come at the right time and from unintended sources. After a rather brutal week, I headed to the musical on Thursday evening. Little did I know how much impact Dr. Seuss could make on an audience. Two messages seemed to resonate with the audience as I visited during the intermission. The first one was from Here on Who...

The services for Westlake Coach Doug Wilson will be held Saturday, Feb. 8 at 3pm at Austin Ridge Bible Church, Sanctuary A.

In lieu of flowers, the family has requested donations to be made to the Eanes Education Foundation. Click here for more information.

COUNSELING / SUPPORT SERVICES

HEALTHY CHAPS / Support Counselors

Please visit our Healthy Chaps web site for all kinds of helpful resources and tools for both parents and students. Read previous blogs, watch previous Speaker Series, AND MUCH, MUCH MORE!

COURSE SELECTION
The process for selecting courses for next year is in full swing at Westlake. This week counselors started meeting one-on-one with freshmen to answer questions and review course requests. We encourage families to work together building a schedule that finds balance between academics, extracurriculars, and life using the Time Management Worksheet and Hours of Homework/Week document. These resources, along with others (including the Course Catalog) can be found at the top of this page. Students are expected to update their Career Plan (four-year-plan) in Skyward since we will pull courses for the 2020-21 school year from it. Students have until February 19 to make changes. When complete, both student and parent are required by State law to sign the four-year-plan; an eSignature can be made within the Skyward Career Plan (instructions here).

AP EXAMS
If your student dropped an AP course this semester and no longer plans to take the AP exam in May, please notify AP Coordinator Heidi Sauer (hsauer@eanesisd.net). A partial refund is available until March 2, 2020.

SOPHOMORE MEETINGS
Sophomore meetings will be March 11 and 12 -- parents are invited to attend. Learn more here, and watch for an email in the next week or so with more details.

PTO

PTO MEETING DATES

Chap Connections Newsletter

PROJECT GRADUATION

REGISTER NOW & SEND PHOTOS FOR TODDLER WALL
It's time to REGISTER for Project Graduation at westlakepg.com! Registration is $150 until March 31st. Reserve your ticket, buy a sponsorship, and claim a limited-edition t-shirt. Order a yard sign today, and we will contact you in the spring to personalize it with your college choice. Be sure to sign the contract when registering.

Please send pics for the TODDLER WALL at Project Graduation. Pictures should be 8x10 copies only (no originals). Photo should be of seniors only. No group photos. Do not show the photo to your senior. Pictures will not be returned. Drop off at the front office in the bin marked “Toddler Wall” starting Monday Jan. 27th. Deadline: May 15th.

Go Chaps!
Kristin Paull and Kit Spelce
Co-Presidents, WHS PTO

COOL THINGS & KUDOS

Front (l-r): Taarika Bhargava (10), Amelia Azadi (11), Kinsey Neas (11), Harry Wang (9), Priya Kumar (12), Anna Davis (12), Timothy Pao (12), Abhinav Madduri (12)
Middle (l-r): Ty Revering (11), Maggie Neuberger (12), Maddie Laude (12), Ingrid McDuffee (10), Alexander Wilson (12), Jerry Grace (11)
Back (l-r): Sidharth Srinivasan (12), Mark Willenbring (11), Surya Rajesh (12), Nick Acevedo (12), Albert Zhao (12), Eric Quan (12)

Westlake High School has 20 students who earned an All-State designation from the Texas Music Educators Association for 2020. This is the highest individual honor a high school student musician can receive and only the top two percent of all high school student musicians in Texas achieve.

Front (l-r): Harry Wang (9), Priya Kumar (12), Anna Davis (12), Albert Zhao (12)
Back (l-r): Surya Rajesh (12), Nick Acevedo (12), Ingrid McDuffee (10), Alexander Wilson (12), Matthew Herbst (12), Jerry Grace (11)

All-State Band
Anna Davis (12) - Flute
Priya Kumar (12) - Flute
Ingrid McDuffee (10) - Flute
Alexander Wilson (12) - Flute
Surya Rajesh (12) - Clarinet
Harry Wang (9) - Clarinet
Nick Acevedo (12) - Trumpet
Matthew Herbst (12) - French Horn
Albert Zhao (12) - Tuba
Jerry Grace (11) - Percussion

Front (l-r): Amelia Azadi (11), Maddie Laude (12), Kinsey Neas (11), Taarika Bhargava (10)
Back (l-r): Ty Revering (11), Sidharth Srinivasan (12), Mark Willenbring (11), Maggie Neuberger (12)

All-State Choir:
Amelia Azadi
Taarika Bhargava
Maddie Laude
Kinsey Neas
Maggie Neuberger
Sidharth Srinivasan
Mark Willenbring

(l-r): Timothy Pao (12), Abhinav Madduri (12), Eric Quan (12)

All-State Orchestra
Timothy Pao (12) - violin
Abhinav Madduri (12) - violin
Eric Quan (12) - violin

Westlake High School had seven student-athletes announce their commitments on National Letter of Intent Signing Day, Wednesday, Feb. 5.

Bobby Duncum - Southern Methodist University

Connor Halverson - Yale University

Ty Heironimus - Hardin-Simmons University

Ryan Lindley - Yale University

Leo Lowin - United States Military Academy West Point

Sage Luther - Colgate University

Drew Willoughby - Saint Anselm College

Please congratulate Westlake's T.K. Kim. His film The Town Between the Totems is a Semi-Finalist in the UIL Film Festival. Only 135 of 735+ films advanced to Semi-Finals. There are currently 12 films remaining in his category: Division 2 - Traditional Animation. Pretty cool!

We would like to give a very special congratulations to both our Boys and Girls Swimming and Diving teams, as they won the Regional swim meet this past weekend in Mansfield! We would also like to give a shout out to the Boys Swimmer of the Meet, Jaden Luo, and Diver of the Meet, Nayna Pashilkar. Both our teams will continue on to the State meet next Friday and Saturday, 2/14-2/15 at UT. Thank you again for all you do to support our swimmers and divers!

Girls Golf Teams Take Second!

The Westlake Girls Golf Team has started off the spring season with some trophies! Ana Rodriguez, Katie Taughinbaugh, Emma Davison and Sofia Calavitta competed Friday and Saturday in the 28th Annual Marble Falls High School Spring Classic. After team scores of 348 and 359, the Westlake girls took home second place! With scores of a 75 and 76, Ana Rodriguez also placed second individually! The team will be heading to Victoria this Thursday to compete Friday and Saturday in the Lauren Johnson Memorial Tournament. Go Chaps!!

Great weekend for our FTC teams!

Eanes ISD had 8 teams (4 rookies teams from the middle schools) compete this past weekend at the Austin Metro League FTC Championship. 50 teams competed. We advance four of the 16 teams to the Alamo Regional: PiRho Maniacs, Sigma Summation, Club Oreo and Philobots.

Congrats Club Oreo for the Motivate Award and Philobots for the Think award.

Click here for final results our teams

SCHOOL NEWS

Seussical Musical, Feb 6-8

The Westlake Choir and Technical Theater Departments present Seussical February 6-8. Tickets on sale now!

THE DISTRICT & BEYOND

EISD Speaker Series, "A Conversation About Kids and Guns," Feb 20

Each year in the United States, nearly 260 children aged 17 and under gain access to a firearm and unintentionally shoot themselves or someone else. Nearly 600 more die by suicide with a gun each year. Join us for a conversation about safe firearm storage, and what we can do to prevent these tragedies from happening.