I hope it's OK to post this.

Recently in a casual setting I was discussing different strengths people have with my DD in the presence of a fellow student, who is also tested into the gifted program.

When I started to point out the strengths of some of my DD's classmates, this fellow student started to comment by adding "but he is not very smart", or "yeah but she is not very bright". Some of these I actually disagree since I believe some of them simply have problem testing. I was bothered by the first of these comments. By the 3rd one I wanted to bang my head against a wall.

Clumsily, I told this fellow student that some kids are very very intelligent but can fail the gifted test because they have issue specific to the test. The reply I got was "so they aren't very smart if they can't do the test right".

It's issue of security, is it not? Reaction to a threat to a self-perceived status? I remembered a period of time when DD's test scores started to go up (she was not much of an A student), this fellow student started to demand to know DD's score ("what did you get?"). Not sharing, mind you. DD never knew how this student do in tests.

I don't know what that is and I surely need to find words to describe it. It is disturbing for me to hear this from an 11-year-old. I don't want my child to consider other people as less, or in other way, she is *simply* better, or constantly on the lookout to compete with other children.