Southeast Polk Community School District


Staff
Name	Building	Phone
Tanya Wulfekuhle	Altoona	515-967-3771
Tanya Wulfekuhle	Centennial	515-967-2109
Susan Conner	Clay	515-967-4198
Martha Stearns	Delaware	515-262-3197
Bob O'Brien	Four Mile	515-265-1972
Susan Conner	Mitchellville	515-967-4274
Bob O'Brien	Runnells	515-966-2068
Michelle Varnum	Willowbrook	515-967-7512
Martha Stearns	Spring Creek	515-967-5533
Kathy Wikert	Junior High	515-967-5509
Erin Lane / David Hartman	Senior High	515-967-6631
About Gifted Education
Description By Grade Levels
Expected Student Outcomes
Links
Belin-Blank Center for Gifted Education at the University of Iowa
Iowa Talented and Gifted Association

The Southeast Polk Community School District provides differentiated programming for students who have been identified as possessing very high intellectual abilities. Screening tools include the Kingore Observation Inventory, Cognitive Abilities Test and Iowa Tests of Basic Skills. ITED, ACT, PLAN and EXPLORE are also used as part of the identification process, which takes into account behavioral, medical and economic factors that can mask a student’s abilities.

Each fall and spring, student needs are formally reviewed through a district matrix for appropriate program placement. Gifted education students comprise about five percent of the total student population district-wide.

Program Expectations
Expected outcomes of the program include developing students’ skills in the areas of public speaking, critical and creative thinking, research and self-directed learning while meeting their affective needs.

Our program offers students a greater latitude of inquiry and provides a wide variety of opportunities for exploration, investigation and specialization through seminars, special activites, outdoor field activities, independent study, discussion groups and product development.

Attention is directed toward meeting student social and emotional needs, particularly peer relations with time together for support.

The goals of Southeast Polk's gifted education department in 2008-09 and 2009-10 are:

expand opportunities for teacher/administrator professional development
Increase student's role in development and implications of PEP goals
review SES, gender ethnic and ELL program participation
Increase communication, when applicable, with classroom teachers
Increase community involvement in learning for gifted students
increase ammount of differentiation and acceleration within general classrooms for gifted education students
arrange regularly scheduled district-wide activities for gifted education students