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Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS)
Reply to "Letter to MCPS Superintendent Sent"
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[quote=Anonymous]GTA has sent the letter (through email) with attachments to MCPS Superintendent. It reads: [quote]GIFTED AND TALENTED ASSOCIATIONOF MONTGOMERY COUNTY, INC. Frederick Stichnoth, President Silver Spring, MD fred.stichnoth@... March 21, 2012 Via email Dr. Joshua Starr, Superintendent Montgomery County Public Schools Joshua_Starr@... Re: Forum on Gifted Education Dr. Starr: The Gifted and Talented Association of Montgomery County, its members, and parents throughout the County with advanced-level learners are looking forward to your Forum on Gifted Education this Thursday, March 22, 7:00 p.m., at Magruder High School. Attached to this email are: 1. Questions and Comments for Forum on Gifted Education, addressed to you by parents and students in anticipation of this Forum ([url]http://www.gtamc.org/2012-gt-forum[/url]); 2. Research Recommendations compiled for the Forum by GTA ([url]http://www.gtamc.org/2012-gt-forum/reseach-recommendations-3-22-2012[/url]); and 3. Questions for Montgomery County Education Decision Makers ([url]http://www.gtamc.org/2012-gt-forum/2012-gt-forum-questions[/url]). These documents express the concerns and perspectives of MCPS parents, and are submitted in advance to facilitate communication at the Forum. Parents need to engage with you personally and directly, and to hear your vision for how to improve gifted education in Montgomery County Public Schools. They already engage with each other every day on the GTAletters listserv; they already are familiar with national issues related to gifted education, MCPS Gifted and Talented programs and current implementation in MCPS schools. (In these respects they may differ from your audience at the March 12 Forum on English Language Learners.) They were not heard by your predecessor; they are not heard by the Board or its Committee on Special Populations; they depart, frustrated, from one-way presentations by your staff. We hope this meeting will be different. As you can see from the many comments, parents (and students) have high praise for MCPS magnet programs for the highly gifted. But they are very concerned about local school opportunities for advanced-level learners. Frustration is mounting among parents with young elementary school-aged children, trapped in the new Curriculum 2.0 de-leveled math instruction; they are frustrated at the lack of ability grouping, and express a need for cluster groups of like-ability students for reading and writing, and core subjects like science and social studies; they express concern over the new one-size-fits-all “advanced� middle school courses, increasingly delivered in heterogeneous classrooms. Parents will come to this Forum expecting to hear from you, to address you directly, and to receive a response directly from you, in the way you made possible at your fall Listen and Learn sessions; they are not expecting to be led by staff members in encounter groups with each other. Parents are eager to hear your ideas for gifted education, but they also hope that you will take seriously their experiences and concerns about what is happening in MCPS right now. This is an opportunity for you to begin to build bridges by engaging in a real give-and-take with a segment of the MCPS community that has up to now been excluded from all substantive conversation about how to educate their own children. We are glad you have opened this door, and we hope the format of the meeting will allow parents to feel it was worth their time to step through it. We look forward to a productive exchange on Thursday. Very truly yours, Frederick Stichnoth, President cc: Board of Education Ms. Beth Schiavino-Narvaez, Deputy Superintendent Mr. Erick J. Lang, Assistant Superintendent Mr. Martin Creel, Director, DEIP Dr. Monique Felder, Director, AEI Ms. Kristin Trible, President, MCCPTA Ms. Michelle Gluck, Chair, MCCPTA GCC Mr. Ted Willard, Chair, MCCPTA Curriculum Committee Mr. Doug Prouty, President, MCEA AEI Feedback Council Dr. Jeanne Paynter, MSDE Ms. Keri Guilbault, President, MCGATE GTAletters listserv GTliaisons listserv Parents Coalition listserv [/quote][/quote]
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