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    Schools debate: Gifted and talented, or racist and elitist?
    By Bobby Caina Calvan
    Associated Press
    October 28, 2021

    NEW YORK (AP) — Communities across the United States are reconsidering their approach to gifted and talented programs in schools as vocal parents blame such elite programs for worsening racial segregation and inequities in the country’s education system.

    A plan announced by New York City’s mayor to phase out elementary school gifted and talented programs in the country’s largest school district — if it proceeds — would be among the most significant developments yet in a push that extends from Boston to Seattle and that has stoked passions and pain over race, inequality and access to a decent education.

    From the start, gifted and talented school programs drew worries they would produce an educational caste system in U.S. public schools. Many of the exclusive programs trace their origins to efforts to stanch “white flight” from public schools, particularly in diversifying urban areas, by providing high-caliber educational programs that could compete with private or parochial schools.

    Increasingly, parents and school boards are grappling with difficult questions over equity, as they discuss how to accommodate the educational aspirations of advanced learners while nurturing other students so they can equally thrive. It’s a quandary that is driving the debate over whether to expand gifted and talented programs or abolish them altogether.

    “I get the burn-it-down and tear-it-down mentality, but what do we replace it with?” asked Marcia Gentry, a professor of education and the director of the Gifted Education Research and Resource Institute at Purdue University.

    Gentry coauthored a study two years ago that used federal data to catalogue the stark racial disparities in gifted and talented programs.

    It noted that U.S. schools identified 3.3 million students as gifted and talented but that an additional 3.6 million should have been similarly designated. The additional students missing from those rolls, her study said, were disproportionately Black, Latino and Indigenous students.

    Nationwide, 8.1% of white and 12.7% of Asian American children in public schools are considered gifted, compared with 4.5% of Hispanic and 3.5% of Black students, according to an Associated Press analysis of the most recent federal data.

    ...

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    There are substantial racial and socioeconomic gaps on IQ tests and achievement tests. Gifted programs that do not discriminate in admissions on the basis of race or class will not achieve demographic proportionality. Even if one thinks the gaps would go away if society did X, the primary aim of gifted education is not to close such gaps.

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    Thanks for posting, Bostonian. I find that article to be a fairly comprehensive and all-encompassing summary of many issues discussed over time in educational circles and also here on the forum.

    A few of my thoughts (also repeated over time)...

    Gifted programs vary greatly from one school to another, and from year to year.

    I consistently oppose "lottery" systems, in favor of offering appropriate curriculum, pacing, and placement with intellectual peers for all students. There are enough schools, and enough seats in schools, therefore it IS possible to have seats allocated and re-allocated as needed to match the number of pupils requiring various levels of curriculum, for appropriate challenge level in their zone of proximal development (ZPD).

    In addition to such changes in schools, there is much which can be done outside the school setting, including in the home.

    Parents may wish to have a basic understanding that early brain development sets the stage for abilities later in life. There is much information available about gestational nutrition, and infant/toddler nutrition. In general, processed foods contain empty calories and lack nutrition but some families prefer the packaged "convenience" foods over vegetables, fruits, oatmeal, whole grains, etc. Unfortunately this may create a "food desert" within those households even though the healthy alternatives may be readily available at the local grocer, and may cost less per serving.

    Regarding early development, here is a brief roundup on Early education (preschool)
    - posters on this forum recommend play-based preschool smile
    - Hart&Risley research in the 1960s - Dr. Todd Risley on the value of talking to even the youngest kids
    - Hart&Risley research in the 1960s - NPR Jan 10, 2011
    - Hart&Risley research in the 1960s - high level summary
    - Hart&Risley research in the 1960s - back-and-forth conversation rather than just directives
    - Comparison: Hart-Risley (lasting impact) VS HeadStartprogram (short-term effect)

    Reading books with children, and pausing to discuss what is occurring on each page, role-models making connections and having an internal conversation for processing input. Having books in the home, including free books such as library books, donated books, and/or take-one-leave-one kiosk books supports a child's decision-making and choice of topics to learn more about (internal locus of control).

    Parents may also wish to study up on the topic of advocacy.

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    When I was in grade school, we were in groups through the early grades. Now, it may have been the teacher...airplanes, jets and rockets. I had the same teacher for 3 years, grades 2 through 5 (accelerated through 4). And each group got material geared to their level. You could move groups, you were not stuck. But we were in a group with material geared to our level. What happened to that? You don't have to go with the obvious categories, but yellow, green and violet groups.

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    Originally Posted by Wren
    When I was in grade school, we were in groups through the early grades. Now, it may have been the teacher...airplanes, jets and rockets. I had the same teacher for 3 years, grades 2 through 5 (accelerated through 4). And each group got material geared to their level. You could move groups, you were not stuck. But we were in a group with material geared to our level. What happened to that? You don't have to go with the obvious categories, but yellow, green and violet groups.

    I am a big fan of either streaming classes within a school (current situation for my kids) or streaming groups within a class (my primary school experience which appears to be very similar to yours). I don’t think streaming schools within the education system (my high school experience) is an intentionally racist or elitist practice but the commute is time wasting and it’s much more difficult to maintain friendships outside of school because students attend from a wide geographical area.

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    The ultimate questions for our children for any of these options are:

    1 - How high is the ceiling?
    2 - How flexible are educators to extend beyond the highest offering?

    G&T schools where we are neither lift the ceiling in 1, nor offer any discernible impact on 2. In other regions, I understand G&T programming can drive more meaningful instruction.

    Today, DS10 described the lack of intellectual curiosity of much of the teaching profession as, “wallowing in the squalor of learned helplessness.” IOW, “don’t know, don’t care to learn.”

    That about sums up my opinion of the state of modern education, G&T or otherwise. However we mix and match students and programs, objective standards and rigor are sorely needed for *all* students. IMO, cross-grade grouping with DE opportunities at transition points would be my ask.

    That would provide real equity and respect the needs of individual learners better than any system of which I’m aware.



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    I haven't read the article linked in the OP but one of the origins of G/T programs (back in the late 70s and early 80s) was as an inducement to keep non-minority parents from leaving urban communities for the suburbs.

    At that time, there was stark difference in the educational preparedness of communities of color for reasons that don't need a separate paragraph here.

    Some parents who were not big fans of highly integrated school systems were open about their desire to leave urban communities. The creation of G/T programs were a solution to that. At the time, induction to those programs was largely based on teacher recommendation - which resulted in the expected racial disparities at the time.

    The extent to which such things are relevant to the current discussion of G/T programs is specific to the question if the programs were truly designed to maximize gifted potential. If they were then they should still be fine. But if the original intent was as much political as anything else then it might be time to explore other ways of maximizing the potential of the student body.

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    Separate and apart from the above post - G/T programs are rarely tuned to the highest levels of gifted. They're mostly aimed at kids just smart enough to get in and move at a pace that's too slow for your real far end of the bell curve kids.

    At the same time, kids who just miss the cut-off of the program by a point or two are still relegated to a curriculum that fails to satiate them. Is a kid with an IQ of 128 really so different from a kid with an IQ of 130 that they deserve significantly different curriculums?

    And given that a kid of 130 is pretty distinct from a kid of 150 can they really both be served by the same gifted curriculum?

    I think the answer to both questions is "no" and so a better solution is needed for everyone.

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    Originally Posted by philly103
    Separate and apart from the above post - G/T programs are rarely tuned to the highest levels of gifted. They're mostly aimed at kids just smart enough to get in and move at a pace that's too slow for your real far end of the bell curve kids.

    At the same time, kids who just miss the cut-off of the program by a point or two are still relegated to a curriculum that fails to satiate them. Is a kid with an IQ of 128 really so different from a kid with an IQ of 130 that they deserve significantly different curriculums?

    And given that a kid of 130 is pretty distinct from a kid of 150 can they really both be served by the same gifted curriculum?

    I think the answer to both questions is "no" and so a better solution is needed for everyone.

    Well said.


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    As philly notes, many magnet/GT programs were designed to keep middle/upper middle-class white families from leaving the public school systems in question, which is an important nuance to recognize, since the article highlights only that many similar programs were designed to evade separate-but-equal legislation by creating de facto segregated schools. Both origins are historically accurate (programs to promote desegregation and programs to segregate), reflecting one of the reasons so many GT programs are educationally unsatisfying for actual GT learners: they weren't designed principally to service their learning needs.


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