Educators and Parents

Faculty application for GSI at WVU are available. See the link "Applications & Forms"

GSI School Level Responsibilities - Final state submission date is March 25

The school counselor is often the person in charge of coordinating the selection for GSI. At first it seems daunting, but counselors who familiarize themselves with the following steps find that the process works well.

Ensure student participation in the Governor's STEM Institute..
Coordinate and dove-tail due dates with county coordinator.
Because they are dealing with middle-school students, counselors may have to take an active part in encouraging qualified students to apply for GSI.
Counselors or others designated by the principal should notify students who meet the qualifications and go over the information on the web site. One effective way would be to meet with the potential candidates in the computer lab and navigate the web site with the entire group. At that time, the students could also download the application.
Post information about the web site in all 7th-and-8th-grade science and math classrooms.
Arrange to have someone type applications for students who cannot type their own.
Send information about GSI home in the school newsletter.
Set a date that applications are to be turned in by the students and inform students of the date.
Each school shall convene a selection committee that consists of the counselor, a science teacher, a math teacher and, when possible a teacher of gifted students.
Plan your selection meeting early enough so that if school is cancelled you will still have time to reschedule and meet the deadline.
The school selection committee shall send in rank order by grade the names and applications of no more than 14 students to the county superintendent’s office;
Submit school nominees and applications to the county coordinator using the School Recommendation Form.
Staple each application in the upper left-hand corner. Do not use paper clips or binders;.
The recommendation form can be completed on a typewriter (do they still exist?) but may also be completed by hand.

Parents of home-schooled students shall contact the board of education office in their county to discuss the deadlines for submission to the county office. Those parents may contact Sherry Keffer, cheryl.keffer@k12.wv.us, to find the name of the county coordinator. Because there is not a principal or counselor in the home-school setting, a narrative of what the student has accomplished may accompany the grades and any test scores. Home-schooled students must also provide a copy of immunization records required by West Virginia public schools.

GSI County Coordinator Responsibilities

The county coordinator for GSI is the person appointed by the superintendent to serve as a liaison between the district's schools and the director of Governor's Schools.

The first thing the county coordinator should do is read through the entire website, looking for appropriate forms and making note of important information. For example, the link to the Superintendent's Selection form is near the bottom of this list.
County coordinators should contact each school with 7th and 8th graders to let the counselor or principal know when the applications are due in the central office. This includes both public and private schools.
Each county has the privilege of nominating students in the 7th and 8th grades to attend the GSI.
The county selection team shall consist of one teacher of math or science from each represented school in the district, a counselor, a teacher of gifted students, and others as deemed appropriate by the superintendent or his/her designee.
When selecting students, try to be equitable across schools unless there is a serious breach in the quality of applicants.
Using the apportionment guidelines printed on the Superintendent's Selection Form, submit the appropriate number of nominees for each grade.
Mail the Superintendent's Selection Form and applications by the date set by state director.
Check to see that the pages are stapled and ordered numerically, with the essay and transcript/test record at the end.
Staple the complete application. Do not fasten with paper clips, do not send photographs, and do not put each application in a separate folder. Mail to:

Sherry Keffer, Coordinator of Governor's Schools
West Virginia Department of Education
Building 6, Room 221
1900 Kanawha Boulevard East
Charleston, WV 25305

Parent Information

The Governor's Schools of West Virginia offer valuable and unique experiences for the youth of our state. The Governor's STEM Institutes are designed to pique the interest of middle-school students--a time in their educational journey when many seem to lose interest in the STEM courses. By solving real-life problems in cooperative learning groups, students who attend the GSI get a taste of what it's like to be a scientist...a mathematician...a creator...a difference maker.

As you well know, parents play a vital part in their children's social, emotional, physical and mental successes, and parental nurturing and high expectations continue to drive students forward.

Please encourage your child to look to the future and apply to attend the GSI. Many times, students will say that they "don't want to give up their summer." As a matter of fact, several students who have actually attended GSMS have arrived with that attitude, but they had parents who said, "You need to do this." On closing day, those students were shedding as many tears as the others because they hated leaving.

The students at GSI work in small groups, and when they are not in class or the dorm they are in groups supervised by a college-age mentor. Mentors or teachers accompany students by class from the residence hall to their classes.

GSI students at WVU will be housed in Honors Hall in two-room suites with a connecting bath.

GSI students at Green Bank will be housed in the Bunkhouse with 30 females and 30 males.