The Keystone Connection

The start of the 2024-2025 school year has been nothing short of amazing! Thank you all for entrusting our staff with your children and for allowing us to be a part of their educational journey. Over the past few weeks, I have had the opportunity and privilege to spend time visiting our campuses, learning from our staff, and getting to know our students. I continue to be amazed by the caliber of our students, staff, and our school community. Our ceiling as a community of learners is limitless, and I am excited to continue to spend time listening and learning from all of you as we develop our vision for the future of Keystone together.

Our Keystone School Community is a special place and we should all be very proud of the experience we provide to our students. Again, I have been incredibly moved by how great our students are, as well as the pride that everyone has in our schools.

Throughout the first month of school, I have been reminded that we can be the best. There is nothing that is stopping us from offering a world-class experience to our students and being the leader for other schools to follow. By kicking off our year with a reset and refocus, we have been able to continue to put our students first and keep the focus on their learning.

We are a learning organization, and we will continue to build on a culture of excellence that is committed to the learning of ALL students.

One of our goals during the remainder of the first semester is to provide all of our stakeholders with a voice and the opportunity to provide feedback in helping craft a shared vision for the future of our school community. We encourage you to attend our Coffee Talk Series, as well as attend future events where you can engage in discussion around our priorities and make Keystone the best that it can be for our students.

We have so much to be proud of as a school community and I challenge all of you to engage in helping create our shared vision for the future. This is your school system and if we remain focused on our students and their learning, anything is possible. Let’s continue to work together to make sure that Keystone leads the way!

Zach Weagley, Superintendent

Keystone Local Schools are proud to announce that we earned 4.5 STARS on our State Report Card!

Issued yearly by the Ohio Department of Education, a school’s report card rating is based on the district’s score on five measures of performance criteria: achievement, early literacy, progress, gap closing, and graduation rate.

Click on any of the images below to enlarge. Below, we featured each school's rating as well as math and English language arts achievement and our graduation rate, along with a comparison to similar districts as well as state totals.

View ALL of Keystone's results @ KEYSTONE SCHOOLS STATE REPORT CARD DATA.

The Gap Closing component shows how well schools are meeting the performance expectations for our students in English language arts, math, and graduation. It also measures how schools are doing in supporting English learners to increase language proficiency, reducing chronic absenteeism for all students, and identifying gifted students and providing gifted services.

The percentage of students who are successfully finishing high school with a diploma in four or five years.

Funded by a grant from the Education Service Center, the Opportunity Way Cafe (OWC) began in the spring of 2022. To utilize the cafe, staff are sent weekly order forms and can choose a variety of items: coffee, tea, baked goods, cappuccinos, and more!

We are thankful for all the benefits the Opportunity Way Cafe brings to our schools! They truly fulfill their mission to provide opportunities for student growth and create a culture of support and comfort. Program leader and KMS Intervention Specialist Heather Lahoski, states, "Opportunities are endless with open minds."

Find information about all the curriculum being used at each grade level and access state and district testing resources, schedules, graduation requirements, learning standards, and much more @ Keystone Curriculum Homepage.

Thus far, students have completed fall benchmark assessments with either MAP or Acadience assessments. MAP data is used for gifted identification in grades 2-10, and Acadience is used as our dyslexia screener as well as reading diagnostic.

Keystone Local Schools conducts Child Find activities in an effort to locate and evaluate children, birth through 21, who may have disabilities. Public schools are required to provide a free appropriate public education regardless of a child’s disability. In order to provide services to children, they must be identified.

Many children with disabilities are not visible because they do not function in the mainstream of the community. They may be children who are homeless or children of migrant families. Many unidentified children with disabilities are preschoolers. Parents may not be aware their child has a disability or that there are programs and services available. These services are provided without charge to families who live in the school district.

The purpose of Child Find is to identify children who are having difficulty in their development and provide services to them, when appropriate.Areas of concern for parent(s)/guardian(s) to contact Child Find may include: hearing, vision, speech/language, motor, social, emotional and thinking skills. All information is confidential.

Keystone Local Schools has policies and procedures for special education available and has appointed one person to make sure that such procedures are followed. If you have, or know of, a child who may have a disability, please contact Keystone Local Schools Director of Pupil Services, Mrs. Kara Griswold, at 440-355-2424 for more information and assistance.

Mark your calendar for our Wildcat Wonderland Vendor and Craft Show on Sunday, November 17 from 11am-4pm. Interested in being a vendor? Application is available @ Vendor Craft Show.

Attention parents interested in helping make this year's AFTER Prom a success! We will post information about the first after-prom meeting on our Facebook page @ https://www.facebook.com/KEYSTONEPTA.

The 8th Grade Dance Committee is forming. Please join them for the first meeting on Monday, October 14 at 7pm at KHS in Room 111 (turn left when you enter through the athletic doors. Another way you can support the 8th grade dance is by signing up to sell concessions at KMS. Sign up @ 8th Grade Dance Concessions.

Please consider joining the PTA this year! Our membership form is online @ 2024 KMS/KHS PTA Member Sign-Up. Alternatively, you can print the form @ KMS/KHS PTA Membership.

Keystone High School senior Patrick Cahill earned two highly-distinguished awards: a commendation from the 2025 National Merit Scholarship Program and the CollegeBoard's Rural and Small Town Recognition Program for his PSAT scores.

About 34,000 Commended Students throughout the nation are being recognized for their exceptional academic promise. Commended Students placed among the top 50,000 students who entered the 2025 competition by taking the 2023 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT®).

"Those being named Commended Students have demonstrated outstanding potential for academic success," commented a spokesperson for NMSC. ''These students represent a valuable national resource; recognizing their accomplishments, as well as the key role their schools play in their academic development, is vital to the advancement of educational excellence in our nation. We hope that this recognition will help broaden their educational opportunities and encourage them as they continue their pursuit of academic success."

Congratulations Patrick!

Click on any of the images to access our school breakfast and lunch menus. Nutrition information district pricing, and ingredients are also available from the links to our menus.