I am seeing a lot of articles these days, one town in NJ recently had a parent 'mutiny' and has been forced to implement a GT Maths program. I hope that the NCLB pendulum has finally begun to come to rest pending a reverse swing.
I've become cynical on that score, I'm afraid-- I used to think that it was a pendulum. Not sure I think that anymore, because every "new" thing I've heard proposed since about 1990 strikes me as... er...
well, you know the old colloquial advice-- "When you find yourself in a hole, quit digging."?
Pretty sure that a lot of policy makers never heard that one. Or if they did, they didn't understand what it meant.
It's appalling how many states the described practices (OH-specific in the link) actually apply to. Oregon is another state in which students are "identified" and supposed to be "served." But they aren't, because there is no money and no real mandate. Ergo, no identification even happens in low SES districts where parents don't push for it, and even in very high SES districts within the state (like mine), there is still virtually nothing done for actual gifted students because of vast over-identification and too-broad ability grouping. Oh, my district believes in AP for all, all right... but they mean for EVERY senior in the district, whether or not it's actually appropriate. If you need something more than AP for challenge, or if you need it as a middle schooler or freshman, you're out of luck.
Justifying gifted education on the basis of the future benefit to the country always makes me uncomfortable. All children should get an appropriate education- what the do with it is irrelevant. You wouldn't deny someone an education on the grounds they would never provide any benefit to the country.
Wouldn't it be awesome if policy-makers would stop to consider that regarding education as a "scarce commodity" probably doesn't serve either end of the bell curve very well??
Maybe then they'd quit pitting the tails against one another and start-- I dunno-- actually giving those kids the education that they need?
The biggest problem with policy / laws is a general lack of understanding of the needs of the gifted and the risks of not fulfilling those needs.
Even here in Iowa where the Belin-Blank Center for gifted education is listed in state policy as a go to resource, the state most often completely ignores their research and the state policies are so vaguely worded that it's far too easy for any school district to do as they please without ramifications.
Well, that kind of policy-making isn't limited to gifted education, certainly. That seems reasonably common across a wide range of policy issues, at least around here.