Baltimore County Public Schools



4800600-114300Baltimore County Public SchoolsCitizens Committee for Gifted and Talented EducationSeptember 6, 2017MEETING MINUTESGT CAC members present: Julie Miller-Breetz (chair), Jessica Paffenbarger (immediate past chair), Katie Lehr (vice chair), Joyce Di Rienzi (secretary), Karen Syrylo, Charles Kassouf, Marlena Pearsell, Sharon Saroff, Diana SoucyBCPS staff members present: Wade Kerns (coordinator, Office of Advanced Academics), Ann Miller (member of BCPS Board of Education)Location: Greenwood Mansion, Board Room AAgenda Item: 1. Parent/attendee concerns (15 minutes) 7:00 – 7:15Notes / Action steps: Ann Miller, BCPS Board of Education member, shared that there is an online training available on open meeting requirements (see Maryland HB 880): . No designee is required if the group will never meet in closed session.All GT CAC minutes, through April 2017 have been approved. Joyce Di Rienzi will send May minutes out for approval in near future.2. Updates from Advanced Academics office – Wade Kerns (15 minutes) 7:15 – 7:30Notes / Action steps:Dr. Renard Adams has been named as the new interim Senior Executive Director of Curriculum Operations, replacing Christina Byers, who is now a community superintendent. Dr. Adams was previously in the Research, Accountability, and Assessment office and is whom Wade will now report to.The previous Advanced Academic elementary resource position that Donna Godwin (who retired over the summer) held has been converted into a high school resource position and has been staffed by Jennifer Meehan, previously an English teacher at Towson High School. Jennifer will spend much of this year listening and learning about what is happening in GT/AA classes in high schools. The goal is to help bring more procedural clarity and order to high schools, similar to what has already begun to happen in elementary schools.Policy/Rule 6401 was recently sent to the law office. After law, it will go through a variety of steps internal to BCPS (Executive Director Academic Team Meeting (ATM) Superintendent’s Cabinet) and then will likely be in front of the Policy Review Committee (PRC) in November.There will be a first quarter Advanced Academic (AA) facilitator day at the Radisson North Conference Center in Timonium on 10/26/17. Julie will follow up with Wade on how the GT CAC can be involved with this.The M2 program is being field tested as a supplemental resource for advanced students in the 2nd grade. The AA Office has heard that the 2nd grade math curriculum needs some bumping up. (More on the M2 and M3 program: )The AA office’s budget request for ELA materials was fully funded.Piloting the CoGAT as a cognitive assessment as part of the GT identification process is moving forward; data sharing and student privacy concerns are being ironed out. It is possible that the piloting could begin in November of 2018.E-learning funding for AP courses is in place in order to support AA/GT students receiving Home & Hospital services.The AA office gave some written input on ESSA, but has otherwise not been part of the ESSA process.3. Updates from chair – Julie Miller-Breetz (15 minutes) 7:30 – 7:45Notes / Action steps:Curriculum visitors’ day occurred on July 12 at New Town High School. Julie was able to visit with groups working on science, math, and the ELA curriculum.Julie has been asked to be a part of the learning management system (LMS) committee. The current LMS contract with Engrade () is expiring so a committee is being put into place to rate and review vendor bids. Introductory meeting will be on 9/14/17 and follow-up meetings will be 10/10/17 – 10/12/17.Julie is continuing to look into whether the annual report that the MD State Advisory Council for Gifted and Talented Education is a public document, where it can be located, and whether the advisory council publishes its meeting agendas and/or minutes. Knowing the areas the state advisory group is working on could be helpful to local area GT advocacy groups.Remarks to BOE on 8/22/17 regarding the need for BCPS to develop and offer summer programs for GT students was positively received. Julie anticipates hearing from BCPS administrative staff as follow-up to this.4. Summer GT programs – group discussion (30 minutes) 7:45 – 8:15Notes / Action steps:Discussed possible summer programs that BCPS might want to consider offering like:Outdoor/nature programsScratch/MinecraftRegional camps that could rotate throughout the countyCompetition-based programs (see here for a good list of a lot of academic competitions in a variety of subject areas: ) that could also be used for after-school clubs or enrichment-based school programs during the school yearHoward County’s GT summer institutes: (pp. 16 - 21)Fairfax County’s (VA) Young Scholar program: programs, designed to support students who are ready to subject- or grade-level accelerate.Programs for precocious pre-K studentsPrograms designed around transitions (for example, students moving from non-AA/GT classes to AA/GT classes and providing support for any missing content)Julie is sending feelers out about other districts that may be offering exemplary summer GT programs; asks that everyone do some research into this.Things to consider: What grade levels should be serviced? What outcomes are desired? What would it look like? Why put money into summer programs rather than into GT programs accessed throughout the school year?5. GT CAC meetings for 2017/18 school year – group discussion (15 minutes) 8:15 – 8:30Notes / Action steps:October 4 – due to scheduling/location issues, will move this meeting date to Thursday, October 5th and Wade will look into getting Towson High School’s library as a meeting space. Focus of the business meeting will be to work on prioritizing our advisory stances.November 1 – Tiffany Wendland, BCPS secondary coordinator for science, speaking about the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). Room 114, Greenwood.December 6 – Verletta White, interim BCPS school superintendent. Room 114, Greenwood.January 3 – Business meeting. Room 114, Greenwood.February 7 – Listening post at an as yet undecided school. Last listening post had very low attendance. Suggestion was to figure out the area we would like to do the listening post in and then send out emails to lots of schools in that area and see if anyone volunteers to host it. Likely to get better turnout that way.March 7 – Snow date for our February listening post meeting. If we don’t need it as a snow date, use if for either a meeting about the use of personalized learning software for GT math students or a meeting about MAP scores. April 4 - “Non-traditional paths” – not everyone goes to college straight out of high school! Gap years, work, entrepreneurship, military service, etc. Julie will get in touch with Doug Handy, coordinator of the Office for Career and Technology Education for possible speakers. Room 114, Greenwood.May 2 – Twice-exceptional (2E) learners; possibly with SECAC? Room 114, Greenwood.June 6 – Business meeting/officer election. Room 114, Greenwood.6. GT CAC goals for school year – group discussion (30 minutes) 8:30 – 9:00Notes / Action steps:In order to prep for the December meeting with Verletta White, need to prioritize and think through our advisory stances. Julie to send out email asking everyone to choose their top two priorities from each of the four advisory stances and then rate the resulting eight on a 1-8 scale. We will use this to work from at our October 5th meeting.7. Board of Education remarks – group discussion (15 minutes) 9:00 – 9:15Notes / Action steps:Discussion about what issue(s) should be addressed in upcoming remarks to the Board of Education. Consensus was low staffing in the Advanced Academic office should be the focus for the next several remarks made to the Board.8. Anything else? (15 minutes) 9:15 – 9:30Notes / Action steps:Joyce, after a decade+ of being the secretary for the GT CAC, would like to step down as the secretary. Julie will serve in this capacity until an alternate can be found. Please let Julie know if you’re interested! ................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download