RIAGE Regularly Runs Statewide Meetings

Statewide meetings are an effort to support the continuation and ongoing evaluation of gifted/talented and enrichment educational programs in Rhode Island, and to advocate for programs which will provide educational opportunities appropriate for gifted/talented students.

2007/2008 Meeting Dates

• October 25, 2007
• November 29, 2007
• December 16, 2007
    Sunday Family Holiday Celebration
    Cranston YMCA, 1225 Park Ave., Cranston, R.I. 02910 (401)943-0444
    Swimming from 12:30-1:30, party room from 1:30-2:30
    Children under the age of 8 are required to have an adult in the pool with them.
• January 31, 2008
• February 28, 2008
• March 27, 2008
• April 23, 2008
• May 28, 2008 Meeting of the Minds Professional Development Workshop
• June 22, 2008 Summer Family Fun Day

RIAGE Offers Programs with Speakers

RIAGE presented Kathi Kearney of the Gifted Development Center in Denver, CO as our Special Guest Speaker. Kathi spoke about Leta Hollingworth, her research with gifted children in the early 1900s, and the relevance of her findings for gifted children in school today.

Dr. Deirdre Lovecky, Ph.D., Director of the Gifted Resource Center of New England was RIAGE's Special Guest Speaker. Dr. Lovecky's talk "The Twice Exceptional Gifted Child" was about gifted children who have learning disabilities, ADHD, Asperger's Syndrome, or other behavioral or mental health disorders.

Wenda Sheard, attorney, teacher, and mother of three gifted children, was RIAGE's Special Guest Speaker in May 2007. Sheard's talk "Out-of-the-Box Strategies" was about strategies used by wise schools and parents to meet the emotional and educational needs of gifted children. The out-of-the-box ideas included multiple ways to bypass educational gold-standards such as the curriculum, the grade level, the diploma, the textbook, and even the teacher. Some of the ideas included hobby immersion, school-as-smorgasbord, student-created curricula, and theo-therapy. In an effort to equip participants to advocate successfully for out-of-the-box programming ideas, the presentation included hints on how to best use social and emotional arguments to win what's best for individual children.

Dr. Edward Marra, Superintendent in the Bristol-Warren School District, was the featured speaker at the RIAGE meeting on January 31, 2008 at the East Bay Collaborative in Warren, RI.  He spoke about meeting the needs of children with above-grade-level abilities in school.

Nancy Surgenor, Director of Admissions, at The SAGE School in Foxboro, MA discussed educating and accomodating gifted students in a school dedicated to educating gifted children at the RIAGE meeting on March 27, 2008 in East Providence, RI.

RIAGE Participates in Regional Conferences

RIAGE hosted the 12th Annual New England Conference on Gifted and Talented Education, October 20 - 21, 2006 at the Holiday Inn Crowne Plaza in Warwick, Rhode Island. Hundreds of people from all six New England states as well as New York and Pennsylvania attended. Attendees heard talks by experts in the field of gifted education, including Keynote Speakers, Dr. Nicholas Colangelo, Director of the Connie Belin and Jacqueline N. Blank International Center for Gifted Education and Talent Development at the University of Iowa, and Co-Author of A Nation Deceived, and Dr. Linda Silverman, Director of the Gifted Development Center in Denver, Colorado, and Author of Upside-Down Brilliance: The Visual-Spatial Learner.