COUNSELING,
REHABILITATION, AND STUDENT DEVELOPMENT
Nation’s
First School Counseling Program to Offer Gifted Education
Emphasis
School Counseling faculty pictured
L to R: Malik Henfield, Tarrell Portman, David Duys, Deb
Johnson, and Nicholas Colangelo. |
“Next
summer The University of Iowa College of Education’s
nationally ranked school counseling graduate program will
become the first program in the country to offer an emphasis
in gifted and talented education.
Associate Professor Tarrell Portman said school counselors
are in an ideal position to identify and guide students in
need of greater academic challenges. The 12 credit hours of
additional training, which lead to an endorsement or certificate,
will equip prospective school counselors to help prevent such
students from slipping through the cracks of the K-12 education
system.
“Counselors have such a wide variety of tasks,”
said Portman, the program’s coordinator. “We work
with students in the academic, personal, social, and career
areas. With the additional training, our counselors will not
only be knowledgeable about general and special education,
but about gifted education. As a result, they can act as catalysts
for increased identification of gifted students, especially
in the areas of diversity.”
That’s certainly the hope of the program’s co-developer,
the Connie Belin and Jacqueline N. Blank International Center
for Gifted Education and Talent Development.
“This new program is a national breakthrough,”
said Professor Nicholas Colangelo, director of the Belin-Blank
Center. “School counselors have not had training in
understanding the social/emotional and learning needs of gifted
students. Our graduating school counselors will have a distinct
advantage in the job market. But more importantly, they will
be qualified to offer an important service that parents, administrators,
and teachers will welcome.
“Our College of Education again takes an important lead,
and I commit the resources of the Belin-Blank Center to assure
the success of the new program.”
School counseling students accepted for the fall 2006 semester
will begin taking gifted education classes at the Belin-Blank
Center in summer 2006, one an introduction to gifted education
and another on school culture and classroom management. That
will be followed with a practicum in counseling skills at
the center and a class titled “Counseling Gifted and
Talented Students.”
Portman said the UI’s school counseling program, which
has been ranked highly by U.S.News & World Report’s
“America’s Best Graduate Schools” guide
for several years and currently stands as 13th best in the
nation, began pondering the special endorsement several years
ago. She said it made perfect sense to offer much of the specialized
training for prospective school counselors through the Belin-Blank
Center, which brings hundreds of gifted students to campus
each summer for a variety of programs.
“This will allow the voice of gifted education students
to be heard,” Portman said. “This definitely sets
us apart from all other programs.”
Five faculty members with expertise in school counseling and
gifted education comprise the team that will design and teach
the additional courses. –by Stephen Pradarelli
Colangelo
Named Most Influential
EducationNews.org awarded Professor Nicholas
Colangelo, director of the Belin-Blank Center,
with one of 10 first annual Upton Sinclair Awards for
Influential Educators.
Judges described Colangelo as a proponent and advocate
for gifted children and education.
“We feel he is worthy of recognition for all of
his work with the report, ‘A Nation Deceived:
How Schools Hold Back America’s Brightest Students,’“
EducationNews.org’s editors said. “He has
consistently, cogently, and carefully worked for the
education of gifted and talented children for many years,
but his contributions in 2005 were exemplary.”
“Although getting professional recognition is
an honor for me personally,” Colangelo said, “it’s
far more gratifying to know that the Belin-Blank Center
is making a real difference in the lives of educators
who are working to ensure that students have opportunities
to reach their full intellectual potential.”
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