Thanks so much for everyone's input--especially HowlerKarma. I totally understand your frustrations--we have had similar problems at a private school here, with teachers and admin not wanting to accelerate him etc--so it's not like private is some kind of miraculous haven for gifted kids. Anyway, back to the issue...

Portland and San Fran/Bay are both high on the list of priorities. We are left-leaning/bookish and also outdoorsy, and those seem like they'd be a good fit for us. But because we've had some bad school experiences we really want to settle in a place where the kids are not miserable and under-challenged. So thanks!

BTW I am trying to find info on the gifted high school in Portland--do you know the name? I am not finding anything on Portland's school site.

Yes, you're right. Though like North Star, admissions is achievement-based, rather than IQ-based (here's their admissions policy).

Ditto Val's comment on the lack of gifted schools/education in the Bay Area! It's pretty strange, given that there are a lot of bright kids here. We've focused on second language immersion vs. finding a GT school, but who knows how that will work out for my DD in the long run?

California's data puts it in between those two, at just over $86 per gifted student.

One thing that I think is worth highlighting, though, is that CA has identified over 500,000 students as gifted-- as compared with Oregon's 44,000. Washington has similar numbers of students identified as gifted (49,000).

That is significant for one (huge) reason-- there are as many gifted students in CA as there are students in the entire Oregon system. That means that finding peers with similar LOG is simply going to be harder if your pool is only 10% as large. Is that real, though? One might reasonably ask if CA is over-identifying gifted students, which I think is a fair question.

The answer? In Oregon, identification amounts to just over 7% of the state's K-12 students. As I think I noted earlier, in my own district this is something more like 25-30% depending upon the school (yes, we're a smart bunch around here as well), and the criteria are set by state law (I just think the bar is set far too low). Washington's only identifying about 5% of their students as "gifted" and finally, California identifies about 8% of their student population. So maybe there is some over-identification, but it's probably not too bad.

There is one important difference in CA, however, and that is that they also go to the trouble of differentiating between MG and PG students, something which neither WA nor OR does. Needless to say, that's a fairly significant difference, assuming that there are services provided in the first place (which, as I think $7-8 per pupil annually would argue... there aren't in my state ). Of course, with 25-30% of your district being identified, I suppose that adds up to... well, a new gymnasium floor, perhaps.

Hopefully the data here provides some food for thought, or at least a way to dig further.





(Data is from 2010-2011-- http://nagc.org/DataMapbyState.aspx )

There is the Nueva School in SF, which is a great school for the gifted. The Harker School in San Jose is another great school. There are also GATE programs at alot of the top public schools in the SF Bay area. Lowell HS is a phenomenal public school in SF. There are lots and lots of G/T programming opportunities in the Bay area!
I am so jealous- we don't have those kinds of things and just cobble things together best as we can.