Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion talent search too inclusive?

I realize that this board skews my perspective. Our regional talent search invites kids to the recognition ceremony who score in the top 25% of search participants for honors and top 10% for high honors. Does this seem awfully broad to anyone else?

Yes and no. I think that your kid(s) are testing w/ the same talent search as my girls have participated in in past years. For some reasons, back when my kiddos tested, the scores were much, much higher for WATS than other talent searches. For instance, of the three years dd did talent search, there was one year she didn't qualify for the awards. That year, she was 11 and a 7th grader, so admittedly younger than her grade peers. She got a mid 500s score in CR and writing on the SAT, both of which were in the top 10% for places like Duke that put their 7th grade talent search percentiles online. Neither was in the top 25% for WATS that year.

Thanks for the reality check. When DD12 heard that over 1200 people (participants and family) would be at the recognition ceremony and that no one could bring more than 3 guests, she decided that it wasn't much of an honor.

We've had a few experiences lately where it seems like everyone gets some level of recognition. For example, at a recent music festival, everyone DD knew got a score in the top category. On the other hand, all of her friends that she asked are in her gt class and probably prepared just as much as she did. I think that she is struggling to figure out if she is typical kid and if everyone gets these types of recognition. I tried to explain to her without making too big a deal out of it that her Explore results are exceptional.

Also, the Johns Hopkins talent search has a cutoff of above a 550 on math & critical reading for the "basic" awards ceremony for 7th graders, and a cutoff of 700 for the "grand ceremony". Only Duke seems to publish the percentiles for 7th graders (don't see it for Johns Hopkins), and it looks like a 550 is equivalent to 92nd percentile of talent search participants, and the 700 is well into the 99th percentile. Remembering that you are at least "supposed" to have scored in the 95th percentile or above on a nationally normed test to be a talent search participant (I'm sure some really aren't that high, but still), being in the top 8% or 1% of that already talented group seems reasonably stringent, no? But perhaps there are different talent searches that are more lenient with their awards?

Here is the Duke 7th grade data:
http://www.mckinneyisd.net/Docs/7GTSResultsSummary.pdf

Hope that helps!

For NUMATS, 550 is ~85th percentile for 7th graders, and 700 is 99th+. (99th starts at 670 Reading and 700 Math).

sorry to pull up a slighly old post, but wondering if anyone knows where the statistical summary is from NUMATS for this year (or even last year, if you've got it).

In other words, I'd like the source for what AlexsMom said in the above post.

Thanks.

I got it from the NUMATS toolbox. I don't think theres a public link.

It seems Numats has pulled all of links for stats data even for prior years. The data I have is from the toolbox as well. Alexsmom listed accurate information from this years summary. I do find it curious why they pulled all the information down.

You're right! The link I had says that it is bad now. I did find this one that someone else posted online, though: http://www.thinkingahead.com.au/Documents/EXPLORE%20Stat%20Sum%202011.pdf I don't know if it is the same document b/c its been a while since I looked at it, but it looks about the same.

John Hopkins CTY sends information about the distribution of SCAT scores to students who take that test. Does it do the same for talent search participants who take the SAT? If so, could someone please post some summary statistics?