Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment HELP! How to advocate with test scores.

Where are you in NJ? Feel free to send me a PM.

A lawyer might help, as you can argue that they are not providing an appropriate education to your child, but you will not get that off IQ scores alone. Most NJ public schools are not that familiar with SCAT or Explore. I would look toward woodcock Johnson achievement testing. An actual lawsuit, however, is unlikely to do much in NJ. You might track down Michael Kaelber, who is the director of legal and policy services at the NJ School Boards Ass'n and see if he has any advice. He just presented at the NJAGC conference. You might also contact the woman who helps with advocacy at NJAGC (I think her name is Jill Grunewald, but am not sure).

Rita at Heroes is great, but her focus in primarily on getting exceptional students into Rutgers and on some other enrichment activities. I would sign up for Heroes right away and get in touch with her - she is a terrific resource. You might find the NJPOGO list serv and sign up there - there are people there who have managed to convince schools that have never done it before to accelerate.

Get copies of Nation Deceived and Iowa Acceleration Scale, and go back to the Super and say, why are you not using evidence based practice in our district. This is supported by the research. Then go to the BOE with the same question. If the super really has shut you down completely, you need to go, one by one to the BOE and find one (or more) that understands or is willing to listen. You present research and stories and as much as you can.

But first I would say you do need some achievement tests. As our district told us, we need to know what he knows, we don't care that much about IQ.

Don't be worried about them. Your child will likely do just fine. And you certainly would not want him subject accelerated if it wasn't a good fit.

Cat