About Us – Piedmont Governor's School

We are determined to achieve the highest standards

in everything that we do.

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GRADUATES

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CURRENT STUDENTS

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HIGH SCHOOLS REPRESENTED

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SCHOOL DIVISIONS SERVED

Preparing Our Students for the Future

The mission of the Piedmont Governor’s School for Mathematics, Science, and Technology is to provide a challenging, project-driven, research-based curriculum in a technology-infused environment. The school is designed for academically gifted, highly motivated, and high achieving eleventh (11th) and twelfth (12th) grade students from Danville City, Henry County, Martinsville City, and Pittsylvania County school divisions.

Experience

To provide qualified participants with educational experiences that promote interest in and develop skills related to mathematics, science, and technology through research-based projects.

Engage

To provide hands-on, project-based interdisciplinary learning challenges in a laboratory setting that will develop students’ critical thinking, problem-solving, teamwork and presentation skills.

Interact

To provide an environment that fosters a broad exchange of ideas that promotes social, ethical, and personal growth through interaction among students with diverse educational and cultural backgrounds.

Serve

To serve as a resource for schools and communities.

Facilitate

To offer a well-defined curriculum that facilitates the transition from high school to college.

Empower

To empower staff, students, and parents to be actively involved in a collaborative interdisciplinary process.

Apply

To promote the applicability of mathematics, science, and technology to the real world environment.

The selection of students for attendance will be the responsibility of each school division’s steering committee. This committee will include, but not be limited to, a guidance counselor, a school administrator or designee from each local high school, and secondary gifted education personnel. The charge to this committee will be to identify and rank applicants to be invited to attend PGSMST based on criteria set by the governing board. Nominations of potential candidates may be received from a variety of sources including students, parents, school personnel, and community leaders. Multiple criteria will be used to create a pool of applicants from the nominations to insure that a student can not be eliminated by one measure. The criteria may include such items as grade-point averages, Standards of Learning End-of-Course test results, scores from standardized tests, and successful completion of specific courses in mathematics, science, and technology. Students who are eligible to participate in the full two-year curriculum will be given preference in ranking. An information meeting sponsored by local school divisions and the Governor’s School will be held in January or February at various locations for interested students, parents, and patrons. Potential candidates will have the opportunity to a half-day orientation at the Governor’s School prior to the completion of the selection process. The selection process will utilize percentile rankings on standardized achievement and ability tests, such as the Matrix Analogies Test (MAT); writing samples; unweighted grade-point averages; and teacher recommendations. In the event of a tie between students’ scores, science and mathematics course grades and achievement tests scores in those areas will be compared.

Student Selection

7:45 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. (Student on-site day) 7:30 a.m. – 3:00 p.m. (Teacher day) Web-communication systems to provide additional instructional time

School Day

School Division Diploma with Virginia Academic-Year Governor’s School Seal School Division Transcript PGSMST Transcript DCC/P&HCC transcript for dual enrolled courses

Diploma/Transcripts