If you are still undecided about registering for the conference, here are just a few of the reasons to consider joining us in Wisconsin in July:

An exciting children’s program for ages 8-13, featuring expert program development, activities provided by the nationally celebrated Wholemovement program, and journeys to Milwaukee’s own lake front Discovery World and Harley Davidson Museum. Learn More

A unique chance for teens to bond with other gifted teens in a two-day program just for ages 14-17, including an outdoor day with the Tinkering School at Brookfield’s beautiful Fox Brook Park (below) and a visit to Discovery World in Downtown Milwaukee. Learn More

Breakout sessions from your favorite presenters, such as Susan Jackson, Dan Peters, Susan Daniels, SENG board members, and many others on topics that are important to you, including gifted adults, executive functioning, overexcitabilities, twice-exceptionalism, LGBTQ, creativity, gifted spirituality, and much more. Learn More

Keynote speakers Michael M. Piechowski, Rosina Gallagher, and Joy Lawson Davis. Learn More

CE courses for APA credit by popular instructors James T. Webb, Ed Amend, and Dan Peters, and CE/CEU credits for educators. Learn More

SMPG training, led by Arlene DeVries and Rosina Gallagher, and SMPG Master Facilitator Training for experienced facilitators. Learn More

Shopping and restaurants within walking distance of the conference hotel. Learn More

The summer fun of downtown Milwaukee, only 15-20 minutes from the conference hotel, including the Santiago Calatrava-designed Milwaukee Art Museum (one of the featured exhibits in July is “Animation: Art Goes to the Movies“), the Betty Brinn Children’s Museum, Discovery World, the Harley Davidson Museum, and Bastille Days.

Free airport shuttle service to and from the conference hotel before 10 p.m. (contact the hotel ahead of time if you will need transportation after 10 p.m.). 

What are you waiting for? Register today.

Qualifications:

Candidates for Director positions shall evidence a commitment to the mission of SENG and the social and emotional needs of the gifted. SENG is searching for people with skills to help the organization continue to expand in the areas of effective governance and increased development, as well as those who can contribute to the creation and maintenance of specialized programming. Candidates with strong backgrounds in finance, law, planned giving and information technology are especially needed. SENG directors are part of a working board that commits time to active committee work as well as providing local and national leadership for core constituencies. New Directors should contribute positively to a balanced representation of diverse clients, roles, and geographical areas.

Duties:

1. Actively participating in the governance process of SENG by:

• Becoming knowledgeable about all aspects of Board business and responsibilities in order to contribute insights, suggestions, or critical thoughts for Board consideration
• Attending and actively participating in Board meetings and special retreats (at least 2 annually)
• Attending the SENG Conference and cultivating the interests of others to attend
• Cultivating the interests of others to attend the conference
• Serving on at least one standing committee with active participation involving responsibilities to be carried out in a timely manner

2. Promoting SENG in his/her community and relevant organizations and increasing awareness and interest in supporting SENG and its mission

3. Actively promoting the financial health of SENG by:

• Making a personal contribution to the Annual Fund in an amount appropriate to a meaningful sense of personal investment and ownership
• Actively seeking individuals, corporations and/or foundations who might respond to requests for financial support/gifts
• Being available for one expenses-only presentation annually
• Responding to customer service inquiries forwarded by the SENG staff
• Critically reviewing SENG’s financial statements on a regular basis
• Actively recruiting candidates to fill open Board positions

 Application Process:

1. Complete and submit the online Director Application no later than July 1, 2012.
2. If you have a relationship with a current Director who might sponsor your application, please indicate this on the application. If you do not, a Director will be assigned to your application.
3. Candidates will be contacted in early August to schedule a telephone interview.

Election and notification:

All candidates will be advised by email of the election results by September 15, 2012.

New Directors will be assigned a mentor from the current board of directors and will begin their three-year term on January 1, 2013.

Note that new Directors are asked to attend a SENG board meeting to be held in January, 2013 in Orlando Florida. More specific information will be emailed to the chosen candidates.

Subject to SENG’s finances, and to comply with SENG’s expense reimbursement policy, director s’ ACTUAL expenses MAY be reimbursed for attendance at meetings and annual conferences. The position is otherwise not remunerated. For more information about Director positions or duties, email lori.comallie@sengifted.org.

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Children’s and Teens’ Program Activities At a Glance

Children’s and Teens’ Programs Descriptions

By Jacquie Rogers, Children’s Program Coordinator

The SENG Milwaukee Children’s and Teen Programs are two exhilarating days that engage the curiosity and creativity of gifted learners ages 8 to 17.

The following activities are lovingly and specifically handcrafted for our group of learners by the museums, curators, educators, workshop leaders, services, supporters and coordinators of this event.

Our Excursions

Students from Milwaukee and all over the country are invited to explore the aquatic wilds of the city waterfront with Discovery World’s cracker-jack curators, aboard a shore line cruise where the chemistry, ecology, biology and geology of the Great Lake Michigan are investigated.

Our bright learners encounter, “2 million volts of roaring, crackling, sizzling electricity” and the genius that brought it all to life in a live theater show introducing Nikola Tesla and his hair-raising experiments. Tesla Theater producers proudly assert that this illuminating experience is sure to “inspire SENG students to look for the genius within themselves.”

History and applied physics have never been more thrilling a chase than on tour through the Harley Davidson Museum. Motorcycles are just the beginning. From treasure hunts through WWI and WWII, the Great Depression, support for veterans, ecology, engineering, design and innovation, to the craziest collection of leather jackets on the planet, the patented roar of the engine born in a Milwaukee garage and heard around the world is loud and proud.

Our Workshops

Shifting gears, our program activities are balanced between exciting-active and quiet-active pursuits.

With power tools and salvaged materials, teens tinker, design, engineer and create structures of fantastic, functional form lead by the nationally renown Tinkering School at Brookfield’s beautiful Fox Brook Park:

Lead by the nationally celebrated Wholemovement, young students perform mathematical wizardry in three dimensions and create forms of intricate beauty while learning about the infinite possibilities found in a circle.

We invite students to bring their cameras and record the special events of the weekend so that we may incorporate them into a memorable CD of their two days with SENG.

Students and volunteers are welcome for yoga class lead by magnificent Dr. Marcy Enos, a PhD, from the Orthogenic School at University of Chicago, at the hotel on Friday morning to prepare for the day.

Beverages will be served between meals to ensure students are sufficiently nourished. Bright minds use a lot of energy!

Note: Due to the unique nature of this program, space is limited and registrations will be accepted on a first-come, first-served basis. Only registrations for children with a parent attending the general conference will be accepted. 

Children’s Program Leader: Jacqueline (Jacquie) Rogers

A graduate of the Master of Arts in Learning Disabilities Program at Northwestern University, Jacquie is in private practice with children and their families to optimize student therapeutic and educational opportunities. She is a trained SENG Model Parent Group Facilitator and an accomplished artist. As a learning specialist, she has supervised hundreds of tutoring dyads at the Montgomery Ward/Cabrini Green Tutoring Program. A Life Governing Member of The Art Institute of Chicago, she has experience in program development for other institutions such as the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, the Latin School of Chicago, Near North Montessori, and St. Chrysostom’s Day School. Raising two young adult daughters, she has traveled the world and is conversant in Spanish. Jacquie enjoys working with students of all ages, as she states, “I love the spontaneity, creativity and joy with which children engage the world. They are born scientists, and it is our work to help them explore, inquire and reach for the BIG ideas, freely.” 

Teen Program Leader: Sarah Kasprowicz

Sarah Kasprowicz, past president and current secretary of the Wisconsin Association for Talented and Gifted (WATG), has been an intermediate classroom teacher and resource for the gifted and talented for nearly 16 years at the Merton Community School District in Waukesha. Sarah holds a Master’s Degree in Education from Carroll University, and wrote her thesis on services to support gifted children in the regular classroom. She is also a trained facilitator for SENG Model Parent Groups.

Sarah and her husband are the proud parents of an inquisitive six-year-old boy who loves to read and play on the Waukesha Warhawks hockey team. Sarah enjoys reading, writing and traveling in her spare time. She has enjoyed coaching teens on the volleyball team, and working with them at WATG conferences. She looks forward to coordinating the young adult program for the SENG 2012 conference, and sees a challenge for gifted teens is “to learn to advocate for themselves in a school setting where understanding and resources for gifted education may be limited.”

Jan. 23, 2012 News Release: SENG Concerns for Gifted ADHD Diagnosis

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Recommended Resources

SENG Video: The Misdiagnosis of Gifted Children

NEWS RELEASE

Contact: Marianne Kuzujanakis, M.D., M.P.H., SENG Director and Medical Liaison

Marianne.Kuzujanakis@sengifted.org

Click for additional resources

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

January 23, 2012

SENG Embarks on International Campaign to Educate Pediatricians

About Possible Misdiagnosis of ADHD in Gifted Children

POUGHQUAG, NY – January 23, 2012 – Intellectually gifted children whose needs are neglected or misunderstood may exhibit traits and behaviors that resemble those of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and be wrongly diagnosed, possibly resulting in unnecessary medication and unintended harm, according to the international nonprofit organization Supporting Emotional Needs of the Gifted (SENG).  SENG is developing a public awareness effort to alert the pediatric healthcare community to the potential for misdiagnosis. Giftedness education is currently not a standard teaching component in medical schools and is addressed infrequently in the pediatric medical literature.

SENG recently sent a letter of concern to the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) in response to the AAP’s new guideline discussed in “ADHD: Clinical Practice Guideline for the Diagnosis, Evaluation, and Treatment of Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity in Children and Adolescents”(Pediatrics, 2011, Vol 128 [5], November, pp. 1-17.). The new AAP-directed guideline extends the range of ADHD diagnosis from ages 6-12 to ages 4-18, and fails to include the critical possibility that a child’s intellectual giftedness may contribute to symptoms similar to ADHD. Thus, precocious preschoolers may be at even greater risk for misdiagnosis.

“There is a reasonable amount of professional literature supporting the need for physicians to consider intellectual giftedness…However, the ADHD rating scales have not yet incorporated this consideration into their manuals, and the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) only mentions it in passing. Our opinion is that a substantial number of intellectually gifted children are being incorrectly diagnosed as having ADHD,” according to a letter from SENG leaders James T. Webb, Ph.D., ABPP-Cl; Marianne Kuzujanakis, M.D., M.P.H.; and Rosina M. Gallagher, Ph.D., NCS.

In response to SENG’s letter, the AAP indicated that it will share the information with its committees reviewing the issue, consider the feedback in its next revision of the ADHD guidelines, publish an article on the topic in its newsmagazine, and propose a session on gifted children at its national conference.

James T. Webb, who also co-authored the book Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults and is highly published in the gifted field, believes that while ADHD can and does occur in gifted children, many traits and behaviors characteristic of giftedness are frequently misinterpreted as ADHD, particularly in the very young.

“Some of these traits include being strong-willed, impulsive, impatient with the relative slowness of others, and having the tendency towards heightened sensitivity, perfectionism, and intense focus on personal interests and experiences,” Webb says.

“As pediatric healthcare providers become better informed on giftedness issues, they better understand the value of correctly identifying giftedness in their patient population, and are better able to make recommendations to meet their needs via strength-based planning and educational strategies prior to traditional behavioral and medical interventions,” he adds.

SENG leaders finally propose that future editions of diagnostic manuals (DSM and ICD) provide specific codes for giftedness in the medical record, and recommend that pediatric clinicians routinely consider giftedness in all developmental assessments, particularly when diagnosing ADHD and relevant behavioral and mental conditions.

About SENG

Founded in 1981, SENG is an organization that empowers families and communities to guide gifted and talented individuals to reach their goals: intellectually, physically, emotionally, socially, and spiritually. With more than 12,000 subscribers to its newsletter, and a board of globally respected authorities on gifted education, SENG offers online resources, shares research, and provides webinars for parents, educators, and healthcare professionals. Its 2012 national conference will be held July 13-14, 2012 in Milwaukee, Wis. For more information, see www.SENGifted.org. 

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The Misdiagnosis of Gifted Children

“One cannot go into a pediatrician’s office, go through a quick checklist, and determine that yes, you in fact have ADHD and, yes, you in fact need a prescription.” ~ F. Richard Olenchak, Ph.D.

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