Oklahoma Young Scholars
Welcome to the Oklahoma Young Scholars (OYS) Page!
What is the Oklahoma Young Scholars (OYS) program?
The Oklahoma Young Scholars is a five-year Jacob K. Javits grant awarded to the OSDE from the U.S. Department of Education. In the state of Oklahoma, we call our Javits grant the Oklahoma Young Scholars program. The Jacob K. Javits Grant is a federal grant with a mission to improve gifted education for historically underrepresented and unserved populations. Oklahoma was awarded a $2.3 million, 5-year grant to identify, serve, and support potentially gifted and already identified gifted and talented students from historically underrepresented populations, students with disabilities, students who are economically disadvantaged, or students who are English language learners. We currently partner with 3 school districts across Oklahoma to increase equitable identification and representation in gifted and talented programming: Guymon, Tahlequah, and Shawnee.
To learn more about the federal Javits grant program visit https://www2.ed.gov/programs/javits/index.html.
Summer Workshop for OYS Teachers
We are excited to invite 40 new teachers from our partnering school districts into our OYS Summer Institute this year! For two weeks in July, these teachers collaborated, engaged with, shared, and reflected on topics including authenticity, inquiry-based learning, culturally responsive teaching practices, gifted and talented education, and 5E lesson design. Gaining over 30 hours of GT-integrated professional learning experience from facilitators at the K20 Center and State Department of Education (SDE), teachers came away with valuable resources to appropriately challenge and engage all students through meaningful, authentic learning experiences.
5E Lesson Design
OYS teachers have the unique opportunity to continue their professional learning experience through instructional coaching provided by the K20 Center at OU. The instructional coaching will provide learning and feedback opportunities for teachers to build a community of teachers, administrators, curriculum/pedagogy specialists, and GT experts supporting one another toward a common goal. Instructional coaches will also hold a Lesson Writing Workshop in the fall to provide deeper instruction in the 5E lesson design model to assist teachers in the creation and development of their own 5E lessons. Teachers will have the chance to create, implement, revise, debrief, and publish 5E lessons on the K20 Center LEARN website that is accessible by teachers throughout Oklahoma.
Goals for SY2021-22
1. To utilize the knowledge and expertise of the District Leadership Team to pilot and revise work drafted during the Technical Assistance Series from SY2020-21 including, the GT Plan, a program evaluation, and a multi-criteria evaluation model.
2. To support teachers in more equitable identification of potential GT students through 5E lesson development that is authentic, culturally resposive, student-centered, and GT integrated.
3. To add to the repository of 5E lessons build by OYS teachers to be published for Oklahoma teachers to use.
4. To host Family Engagement events that promote the GT program within each district and build greater partnerships between families and schools.
5. To screen all 2nd grade students at partnering school sites using the Naglieri Non-Verbal 3 online assessment to promote equity and access into GT programming.
6. To complete with fidelity the research components of the OYS grant with the facilitation of the K20 Center at OU.
Contact Us
- Ashley Moore, Director of Gifted & Talented Education, ashley.moore@sde.ok.gov,(405) 522-0081
- Tiffany Neill, Deputy Superintendent of Curriculum and Instruction, tiffany.neill@sde.ok.gov, (405) 522-3521
