Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums THINKING BIG About Gifted Education cut backs and gifted programs

Since it affects our ability to get into gifted programs, is anyone seeing programs cut because of cut backs and layoffs in the school districts?

I also know that in our schools, Spanish and chess are paid for by the PTA and we do all the fundraising to pay for those programs and our fundraising is starting to stall.

Ren

While we don't yet know how the gifted programs will look next year in our district, last night our local school board approved the layoffs of nearly 2/3s of our gifted program teachers. They seem to think the classroom teachers can adequately serve the gifted children -- without training, without resources, but with increased class sizes.

We haven't seen cuts to gifted programming. They may have lost staff at the administrative level but no decrease in gifted program teachers at our school. We are seeing much bigger class sizes just like the rest of the school district. I almost get the impressions that they are packing in as many kids into the gifted classes as they can to protect the program. No one can claim that it is undersubscribed. I just hope that they are not lowering standards to keep numbers up.

It's happening in our area. Think parents would pay for gifted programs after school for our kids?

Why not? It's what parents around here have done for over a decade. (Not kidding.)

All flippancy aside, most GT programming in my entire state has been in survival mode since the early 1990's, and the past four years certainly haven't helped matters any. The meager programming which did exist is even drying up now.

Our home district has completely defunded GATE, increased class size and imposed furlough days and insists they can adequately meet the needs of GATE children through differentiated instruction in the classroom. The reality is that teachers have to spend their time on the lowest performing kids so they can increase test scores and not risk a review or funding loss under NCLB. Those with knowledge of education transfer their GATE kids out of district.

things are fairly depressing at our public school which is a top performing school in an upper middle class community: class size has doubled since they let go of teachers, and the gifted program is cut. Also, support positions are limited so teachers have to manage behavior problem and special needs kids alongside the gifted. They don't even start to work with the gifted coordinator until 2nd or 3rd and my DD is only in K. They are talking about simple shapes and colors in her class, and there isn't any time for recess, crafts, and a decent snack since they are rushing through their short day, and focusing on academics that are much too easy. They have told me that by the end of September that they will have figured out how to group students according to ability, and thankfully, we know of another boy of similar ability (as far as I know) in her class. Fortunately, my DD5 isn't complaining yet. She is outgoing and social and the short day is a plus from her perspective.
Oh, her teacher is kind hearted and well intended, just overwhelmed with a huge diverse class with kids with behavior issues. I thought my DD5 might have problems in the class but she has been adjusting well and not acting out at all. The teacher met with me and said that she asks my DD questions that she thinsk are beyond the others so I think my DD feels more respected than she did by her pre-k teacher who would just baby talk to her. I think her teacher still shoots too low, but it is better than last year.

Illinois has no requirements for gifted. They provide no funding. Our school district does have a magnet program that starts in third grade. The gifted programs in the schools have been cut back though. Our GATE teacher is split between 3 schools. One school gets her 3 days a week (they have 35 students in the program) and the other 2 schools get her 1 day each )they each have 9 students in the program). Last year we had her 3 days a week . This year just 1 .






We would pay for it but the state would say no. We tried it with all day kinder garten and the state jumped in and said if one school has it all schools in the district get it. AND it couldn't be parent paid because that would discriminate.. even though there were provisions in place for scholarships for low income families.

In the city next door to ours (which is a poor, high immigrant area), they basically dismantled their gifted program. It was only a once a week pull out anyway, and my friends whose kids were in it said it was a joke.
Our G/T program so far is holding steady. They take the top 15% or so on competitive exam into it starting in 4th grade, full-time, all inclusive. The secretary and coordinator for the program had their hours cut, so it's harder to get a hold of them to answer questions.
Of course, out here in California, education doesn't seem to be a priority! My first grader's class has 26 kids, and in fourth grade, it goes to 32 kids per class. Ouch. Our PTA last year raised $120,000, which was poured right back into the school to replace funds that the state cut. My kids have two, 20-minute PE classes each week, that's it...

Our PTA raises about 600-700K per year, every year, to pay for the assistant teachers, chess, Spanish. We are constantly grant writing, got huge grants last year for technology. This is NYC, where the best public schools have PTAs that are constantly fundraising, otherwise we would zip. And hence the disparity between the schools in the more affluent zones and ones in east harlem or the south bronx.