Milken Center fellows coming to Fort Scott this weekend

The Lowell Milken Center has awarded the prestigious Lowell Milken Center Fellowship to Jeff Rudkin of Bloomington, Ind., and Shekema Silveri of Jonesboro, Ga.

Rudkin and Silveri will arrive in Fort Scott on June 3 for a week of collaboration with the center.

The Milken Center Fellowship is awarded on the basis of merit to those educators who have distinguished themselves in teaching respect and understanding through project-based learning, or who have the potential for this distinction. The center selects the best teachers in country to collaborate with on projects that celebrate unsung heroes in history, a news release said.

Rudkin has taught video production to seventh- and eighth-graders at Lora Batchelor Middle School in Bloomington for 24 years. He is the sponsor of the school's B-TV program, which has won more than 450 state, national and international awards at film and media festivals.

Rudkin's students were the only youngsters granted official press accreditation for both the 60th and 65th anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz Ceremonies in Poland in 2005 and 2010. The group has also been twice honored by the National School Board Association, twice by the Indiana State Legislature and C-SPAN.

The students have traveled all over the country -- Hollywood, Dallas, Chicago, Florida, Nashville -- to have their work featured and have shot documentaries in Australia, New Zealand, Hawaii, Fiji and Poland.

The B-TV students currently Skype every other week with their partner school, Bourne Community College in England, and will send a crew to shoot documentaries in England, Ireland, Wales, and France this summer. Rutkin's B-TV class has been featured in the Milken Foundation "Connections" publication, the Kennedy Center's "Artsedge" website, and USA Today, among other national publications.

Rudkin was a 2007 Milken Family Foundation National Educator and 2010 Irena Sendler Award finalist. He has been awarded the 2011 International Student Film Festival Hollywood Award of Excellence, the 2007 International Student Media Festival Connelly Award (Outstanding Educator), the 2005 Indiana University Armstrong Educator Award, the 2004 Indiana State Teachers' Association Multi-Media/Technology Award, as well as several local teacher awards.

Rudkin wrote two successful Best Buy Teach grants for his classroom of $10,000 and $5,000, as well as a national Best Buy Teach grant of $100,000 for the Bloomington school system. He also authored multiple Community Alliances to Promote Education grants for his program that total $35,000. He has been a speaker at the National School Board Association conference and Indiana University Celebration of Teaching Awards.

Silveri is a natural leader at Mt. Zion High School in Jonesboro. Bringing to the table an extensive community service background and first-rate academic credentials, she uses multi-layered instruction and well-defined practices, all in a school with a large at-risk student population.

In the classroom, Silveri requires students to produce evidence of learning, justify their perspectives, evaluate their reasoning and set future goals. As part of her instructional approach, Silveri integrates multimedia into her lessons, using websites and blogs and shooting and editing video. Through these methods, Silveri's students not only learn the information, but understand the educational science behind it.

Silveri's pupils posted a 100 percent passing rate on the American literature exit exam. Her three AP classes are filled to capacity and include students who are not normally on an honors or AP track. One of her students was accepted into the Governor's Honors Program for communicative arts.

Silveri also takes her leadership skills outside of the classroom. She is a member of State Superintendent John Barge's Teacher Advisory Council and a member of Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal's Teacher Council. She mentors colleagues, leads implementation of a remediation program for seniors, and serves on the ELA (English language arts) textbook adoption and curriculum redesign teams.

Silveri is also a member of 10 professional associations and a frequent presenter at development conferences, including serving as a professional mentor for the National Council of Teachers of English Early Career Leader of Color Award winners.

"Shekema's teaching career is a testimony of excellence in education," Lowell Milken Center Director Norm Conard said in a news release. "Great teachers like Shekema Silveri are leaders in many academic areas. We feel her most worthy of being a 2012 fellow."