Leaders

Board Officers

Dr. Cheryl Taliaferro has worked in gifted education in a variety of public and private settings for more than 25 years. She currently serves as the Director of Pre-Collegiate Programs in Baylor University’s Center for Gifted Education and Talent Development, where she is working on the development and expansion of Baylor TIP’s programming for gifted students with a specific focus on equity and inclusion. Prior to her work at Baylor, she was instrumental in developing the ASPIRE Academy, a public school-within-a-school for highly gifted students in the DFW area. She also worked for several years for Duke University as an Academic Coordinator for Duke TIP.  The recipient of NAGC’s Gifted Coordinator Award in 2022, she has presented at numerous conferences, authored several articles and book chapters, and most recently co-authored Personalized Learning in Gifted Education: Differentiated Instruction That Maximizes Students’ Potential with Dr. Todd Kettler. She is also the parent of two 2E students (one of whom was radically accelerated) who are both happy and well-adjusted adults.

Clint Von Gundy has been involved in gifted education in Texas for his entire teaching and administrative career. He has worked at Duke TIP, at the ASPIRE Academy for the Highly Gifted, as a district-wide G/T specialist, and at Region 11 as their gifted/advanced academics consultant. He has also served as the Director of Professional Learning for an advanced academics company and as a school turnaround consultant. Clint says that GEFN is filling a void for gifted families that has existed for many years, and he is excited to help build our commitment to engage in bold advocacy and to provide families with important tools for navigating the complex gifted education landscape.

Kim Farbisz is a parent of two highly gifted students, a past President of Grapevine-Colleyville Supporting and Advocating for Gifted Education (GCSAGE), and a GC-SAGE board member for eight years. GC-SAGE helped to create the GCISD ASPIRE Academy for the Highly Gifted which her daughter attends. Kim volunteered for PTA for eighteen years and served a two year term as President of the Council of PTAs in Grapevine-Colleyville ISD. She currently sits on three boards of directors, all of them related to public education. In her professional life, she is an experienced international corporate consultant and has provided business strategy and advice to companies in Great Britain, Canada, Belgium, France, Portugal, Netherlands, and Australia. She currently owns her own business coaching firm and works primarily in the DFW market.

Dr. Jaret Hodges serves as an assistant professor of educational psychology at the University of North Texas. He earned his doctorate at Purdue University, and was a postdoctoral researcher at Duke University. His research interests include underrepresented populations in gifted education, rural gifted education, and gifted education policy. He also has an interest in promoting open science practices and the use of computer programming in education research. He has served for several years as a university advisor to our board and a member of GEFN’s advocacy committee. He is also the proud parent of a precocious young daughter.

Dr. Kate Malter McLean has two GT children and enjoys being connected to the GT community as a whole. She is concerned about the lack of diversity across neurodiversity, gender, race and socioeconomic levels. She believes there are opportunities to improve identification as well as participation in order to be more inclusive. Also, as an I/O psychologist, she is interested in understanding the link between gifted education and ultimate occupation and career success.

Shanteze Morris, B.S.E., M.Ed., has been an educator for nearly 20 years, serving as a classroom teacher, reading coach, instructional coordinator & coach, and mentor across Arkansas, East Texas, and Southern Texas. As a classroom teacher, she worked closely with gifted and twice-exceptional (2e) students, making sure their unique needs were met and that they were both supported and challenged within her classroom. She has also been a campus GT Trainer, equipping educators with strategies to better support gifted and 2e learners while ensuring their needs were fully understood and addressed. Alongside that work, she has served as a parent advocate with the Gifted Education Family Network for the past few years. This work is personal for her as the parent of a 2e student, whose journey has included opportunities like Baylor TIP, dual credit programs, and other academic challenges that opened doors for growth, acceleration, and enrichment.

GT Parent Advisory Council

Parent leaders of statewide GT Parent Groups are invited to join our Parent Advisory Council. Please email us at giftededucationfamilynetwork@gmail.com if you are interested in participating, or with updates to your listing below. The Parent Advisory Council shares the needs of gifted families in their community and helps shape the direction and activities of our network. There is no fee associated; we are committed to ensuring support and access to connections for GT parents from all income levels.

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GT Professional Advisors

Dr. Todd Kettler
Associate Professor of Educational Psychology
Executive Director, Baylor University’s Center for Gifted Education and Talent Development
Former Chair, Texas Commissioner of Education’s Advisory Council for Gifted Education

Dr. Kettler conducts research on access to advanced academic learning opportunities in schools, including access to gifted education. He studies the features of learning designs that support outcomes of exceptional performance, including the development of critical thinking and creative capacity. His book Modern Curriculum for Gifted and Advanced Academic Students (Prufrock Press, 2016) won the Legacy Award for the best scholarly book in the field of gifted education in the United States in 2016.

Dr. Kristina Collins
Assistant Professor, Talent Development
Texas State University
Past President of SENG (Supporting the Emotional Needs of the Gifted); Member, NAGC

Dr. Collins is the core faculty for Talent Development at Texas State University, San Marcos. She serves as Past President of SENG (Supporting the Emotional Needs of the Gifted) and was member-at-large for NAGC (National Association for Gifted Children) Board of Directors. Dr. Collins holds a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology and Ed.S. in Gifted and Creative Education (University of Georgia) along with advanced degrees and educational certifications in mathematics, technology education, and computer science. She is an engineer by training (B.S., University of Alabama) and her research foci include social, emotional, and cultural (SEC) contexts of gifted, advanced, and talent development; STEM identity development in underrepresented students; and mentoring across the lifespan. Among many honors, Dr. Collins was awarded the 2011 Mary Frasier Equity and Excellence Award presented to her by the Georgia Association of Gifted Children (GAGC) for her work in advancing educational opportunities for underrepresented students in gifted education.

Dr. Fred Bonner
Professor and Endowed Chair in Educational Leadership and Counseling
Executive Director, Minority Achievement, Creativity and High Ability (MACH-III) Center
Prairie View A&M University

Fred Bonner is Professor and Endowed Chair of Educational Leadership and Counseling in the Whitlowe R. Green College of Education at Prairie View A&M University. He also serves as the Founding Executive Director and Chief Scientist of the Minority Achievement Creativity and High Ability (MACH-III) Center. His research foci illuminate the experiences of academically gifted African American males across the P-20 pipeline, diverse faculty in Academe, and diverse populations in STEM. He is co-editor of two books with Stylus Publishing, Building on Resilience: Models and Frameworks of Black Male Success Across the P-20 Pipeline and Diverse Millennials Students in College: Implications for Faculty and Student Affairs. His book series Diverse Faculty in the Academy is published by Routledge Press and his Journal of Minority Achievement, Creativity, and Leadership is published by Pennsylvania State University Press. Bonner is currently developing a theoretical framework, ‘Mascusectionality,’ that will explore the engagements of Black men.

Dr. Anne Rinn
Professor of Educational Psychology
Director, Office for Giftedness, Talent Development, and Creativity
University of North Texas College of Education

Anne N. Rinn, Ph.D. is a Professor of Educational Psychology at the University of North Texas, where she also serves as Director of the Office for Giftedness, Talent Development, and Creativity. She has an undergraduate degree in psychology from the University of Houston and a doctorate in educational psychology from Indiana University. She has authored around 75 publications related to the social and emotional development of gifted and talented individuals and the psychosocial skills necessary for the development of talent. She has published two textbooks, Social, Emotional, and Psychosocial Development of Gifted and Talented Individuals (Rinn, 2020) and From Giftedness to Gifted Education: Reflecting Theory in Practice (Plucker et al., 2017). She is an active member of the Texas Association for the Gifted and Talented, the National Association for Gifted Children, and the American Educational Research Association, and she was the co-editor of the Journal of Advanced Academics from 2018-2022.

Karen E. Rambo-Hernandez, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
School of Education and Human Development
Texas A&M University

Dr. Karen E. Rambo-Hernandez is an Associate Professor at Texas A&M University. Prior to her becoming an academic, she was a classroom teacher in Texas for ten years where she worked with mathematically talented students, which still provides much inspiration for her work. Her research focuses on the assessment of educational interventions to improve STEM education, and access for all students— particularly high achieving and underrepresented students— to high quality education. Along with her research teams, she has received over $3.4 million in grant funding from organizations such as the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Education. Dr. Rambo-Hernandez was the 2006 District Teacher of the Year in Coppell, Texas, and she received the National Association of Gifted Children’s Early Scholar Award in 2019.

Regional Liaisons

The Gifted Education Family Network supports and provides connections for families and GT parent groups in all twenty Texas ESC (Education Service Center) Regions.  Our Regional Liaisons help ensure that GT parents in all regions of Texas have access to connections, information, and advocacy support.    

All board members, volunteers, committee members, advisory council members, professional advisors, and liaisons serve on an unpaid, volunteer basis. GEFN is grateful for the time, dedication, and invaluable contributions of every individual involved with our organization.