As part of a seven-week professional development series for Westerville’s gifted educators, Marc Smolowitz met with teachers on Wednesday to discuss his documentary, “The G Word,” currently in post-production.
The film, which is the focus of the district’s professional development series, reveals the economic, cultural and gender diversity of the nation’s gifted and talented population at every stage of life.
“Our department's goal was to shine a bright light on the underrepresented young people whose high potential is overlooked and discounted,” said Lisa Huelskamp, a gifted facilitator at Blendon and Walnut Springs middle schools who organized the training.
The gifted department learned about “The G Word” several years ago and when the production company released video clips from the film that covered six different topics, teachers saw the potential of using those videos to examine different facets of giftedness.
The seven-week series, called “6 Videos and a Podcast” was open to any Westerville educator interested in gifted education. The podcast was a recorded session hosted by The Ohio State University Inspire podcast from Ohio State’s College of Education and Human Ecology. The podcast episode, “Black and Gifted: A Trailblazer's Backstory,” featured gifted education expert Dr. Donna Ford where she tells her backstory on being gifted, black and poor in East Cleveland and how it motivated her to create change for gifted children of color. She also collaborated with Smolowitz, who directed and produced "The G Word" documentary.
“The discussions with the teachers/counselors who are taking part in this seven-week multimedia professional development have been rich in regards to insights realized and misconceptions acknowledged,” Huelskamp said. “By knowing better, we can do better. We also take time to share ideas on what works and take comfort in the fact that we are in this together.”