Keynote Speakers

Keynote speakers for the conference are Kathi Kearney and Colleen Harsin. Kathi, of course, is a very familiar face, having been either a keynote or speaker at a half-dozen of our events in the last decade. She’s going to be talking about Leta Hollingworth’s legacy with regard to the education of our kids. She has worked with gifted children as a teacher and administrator in a wide variety of settings, urban and rural, in public, private, religious, and home schools. Kathi is a recognized expert on homeschooling exceptionally gifted children and wrote the Maine homeschooling law. She is the founder of the Hollingworth Center for Highly Gifted Children and is an affiliate of the Gifted Development Center. Currently, Kathi teaches gifted & talented students in MSAD #51 (Cumberland/North Yarmouth, Maine), and also teaches online graduate-level courses in gifted education for the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs.*

Colleen Harsin will be attending her first BIQ.  She is going to be talking about her experiences as the director of The Davidson Academy of Nevada, a public day school for profoundly gifted students. Prior to Davidson Academy, she worked in the Davidson Institute for Talent Development, where she was instrumental in the development and expansion of the Young Scholars program. In addition, she developed “Advocating for Exceptionally Gifted Young People: A Guidebook,” and worked with Nancy Robinson, Ph.D., to produce, “Considering the Options: A Guidebook for Investigating Early College Entrance.**”

*Portions of this are from Kathi’s biography on the Gifted Development Center’s website.
** Portions of this are from Colleen’s biography on the Davidson Academy website