President’s Message
February 2025
Hello All,
I have the great privilege of working with an amazing group of people on the GHF Board of Directors. We each bring our own strengths to the organization and are willing to step in to support each other at a moment’s notice. While we all have our specific projects and committees, there is crossover and cooperation across the board and I feel so fortunate to be a part of it all.
Today I would like to express a special thank you to Dr. Lin Lim who has served on our board of directors since 2022. While her board term has come to an end, her gifts to our organization are long-lasting. Lin was instrumental in helping us build a healthy, collaborative board through her strong communication skills. Lin has worked tirelessly to form connections across the many organizations that support gifted and 2e families and professionals, which has been a wonderful contribution to the field. Lin is also a GHF author and conference presenter. We look forward to an ongoing relationship with this valuable member of our GHF family.
On behalf of the GHF Board of Directors and our members, I want to thank Lin for her support and hard work and wish her well on her next projects! Thank you, Lin!
Warmly,
Kasi Peters, GHF Board President
January 2025
Hello All,
I’m supposed to be writing a Happy New Year president’s message for our GHF community, but I’m writing from Los Angeles as the city is burning and ash is falling from the sky. I had a very difficult time trying to start this message with “Happy New Year.” What I want to say, really, is “Have a Basic New Year” because what life seems to be boiling down to so far this year is going back to basics: food, shelter, and physical and emotional safety. And while I know I’m dealing with an unprecedented natural disaster here in Los Angeles, it doesn’t have to take a crisis to take things back to the basics.
The families in our GHF community often have to be flexible and proactive; that, in itself, can be overwhelming and difficult. We’ve had many great events at GHF this year, and we’ve heard from a lot of families that challenges keep piling up. It can feel unrelenting, like you’ll never get your feet back under you. As homeschoolers, the responsibility for so much falls on our shoulders. We don’t have a system in place to tell us what to do. This leads us back to the basics.
What does that mean for you and your family? It’s food, shelter, and physical and emotional safety. Do we have those in place? If so, can we be content with that? It’s not an easy answer, especially for our gifted families. During this time of crisis, I’ve been thinking about Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Over the years, I’ve had a realization that for gifted kids, the pyramid is almost tipped upside down. Yes, the basic physical needs are required, but intellectual stimulation and engagement are also on that level for a lot of us, right? So, for this year, I think I’m going to encourage everyone to find their baseline and be satisfied with that. It’s enough to have your physical, emotional, and intellectual needs met. We don’t have to do more than that. Having stimulating conversation in a welcoming space is enough.
Here at GHF, we are committed to creating that space. We have exciting programming coming up for you this year. Per our normal, it is all “come as you are.” Being together in a supportive community can fulfill our basic needs.
Check our events newsletter, “Friends,” for stimulating Conversations, our Annual Conference in May, and our wonderful Co-Op experiences. We had wonderful, community-building events last year that were meaningful and provided practical resources. And, we had fun doing it.
I invite you to stay involved or become more involved this year as much as you are able to do so. We want to hear from you and have you at our events. If there is anything more you would like to see us do, please reach out to me any time at: kasi.peters@ghflearners.org
Thank you for being here and for being part of GHF,
Warmly,
Kasi Peters, GHF Board President
February 2024
Hello GHF Community,
I’m so excited to be writing to you as the new GHF President! GHF has been a huge part of my life for the past 12 years when we first started our homeschooling journey. Since then, it has been my passion and mission to support families who are intentional and proactive about their educational choices. I learn a tremendous amount from not only the amazing professionals GHF brings to our programming, but the intelligent, wise and compassionate families that GHF serves. I am also so fortunate to have made lifelong friends with members of the GHF Board and our volunteers. Needless to say, GHF is a special place and a warm and inviting community that I am so grateful to be part of, and now I am excited to take on this role to continue to bring programming and support to our families! Working alongside our new GHF Vice President, Marna Wohfeld is an honor! And, I continue to be extraordinarily grateful to the GHF Board who bring their passion and expertise to everything GHF has to offer: Erinn Fears Floyd, Lisa Jobe, Lin Lim, Carol Malueg, Ric Mejia, and Kathy Turner dedicate precious time to bringing you the best of the best in the gifted, twice-exceptional and homeschooling world. On that note, we have a solid foundation due to the leadership provided by our outgoing President, Lisa Sticca-Conrod. We are grateful for her time and wisdom. I invite you to reach out to me at any time with questions, comments or ideas about GHF. Thank you for showing up for GHF and being part of our growing, supportive group!
Warmly,
Kasi Peters
June 2024
Hello GHF Community, and Happy Summer!
I’m always excited for summer because for me it means a little break in structuring days and a short reprieve from our busy interest and strength based learning schedule. It also means some travel and some change in scenery, which I always look forward to.
It also means that the annual online GHF Conference is coming! I love this conference for so many reasons. Our conference is special because our community is special and our conference presenters are specifically invited based on the feedback we get from our GHF members about what you need and what you want to hear about and who you want to engage with. So this conference is designed especially for you!
We aim to create a welcoming and comfortable environment for both our presenters and our attendees with a lot of time to interact, connect, engage and learn from each other. Our presenters are invited to try something new and speak about what they find truly meaningful, matching the authentic vibe of homeschoolers. You are invited to come as you are, from wherever you are on your educational journey and from wherever your summer travels have taken you. I know I’ll be attending part of the conference from a concert hall in Texas so I can listen to my son play in a few piano recitals in between sessions.
I invite you to join us whether you are a new member who wants to sit back and simply listen in or whether you’ve been attending all of our events for years. We are excited to have you all!
Warmly.
Kasi Peters, GHF Board President
“So long, and thanks for all the fish” -Barry
2023
Dear Friends,
It has been an honor and a pleasure occupying the role of GHF Board President. After 4½ exciting years, I have decided that it is time that I give someone else a chance to inject new energy into the organization.
For me, the most exciting progress for GHF has been the evolution of the Mission, Vision, and Value statements. For the GHF Board of Directors, these statements are more than words on paper to be used for marketing or for checking off a box. We have used these statements as guidance for everything that we do in the organization. Board recruitment, programming, and our culture are all in line. We have no question as to why we are here, what we are doing, or for whom we are supporting.
Originally organized as the Gifted Homeschoolers Forum (GHF), we have had the opportunity to break down why families have needed this GHF. At first, we looked at what we do as only supporting the homeschool journey, but what we have found is that there is a meta step above that. We are a community of families who do not fit into the system based on the uniquenesses of giftedness. For some, that has meant accelerated learning that is self-paced and/or self-directed. For others, it is the intersectionality of multiple exceptionalities. Gifted children who were diagnosed with learning disabilities were not able to get a fair and equitable education. School systems had no idea how to support our kiddos.
The essence of GHF has been families taking charge of their children's education. Before schools had a 2e model by Susan Baum or families could supplement with the early online leaders like Online G3 and Athena's Advanced Academy, our families had to do it all on their own through homeschooling. We know that over half of our families were not planning on homeschooling their children. They did it out of necessity. This leads me to my next point, as more opportunities for our children have developed, our role has changed in the process.
"Whether they know it or not,
all families are homeschool families."
Today, we have more choices and families have the challenge to make the right decisions based on the uniqueness of each child. Our efforts as gifted homeschool families have formed a new model that we call Gifted Home Education. Whether they know it or not, all families are homeschool families. The question is whether we give up our power to the system or if we use our power as families to make strategic, proactive, and intentional, educational choices. Whatever your choices are, they are what is right for you at the moment. Making your own decisions regardless of what tools, methods, and partners you use, is Gifted Home Education.
This point of view is how and why GHF is expanding beyond supporting traditional homeschool families to also include all families who decide to use their own power to make the choices that are right for their own children. That is why you are seeing us double our efforts to include experts who support after-school and in-school decisions.
It is about time that we shared a common mission and vision with all gifted families.
We are all Gifted Home Educators.