Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment Naglieri as sole test for GATE admissions

I just learned that my 8-year-old did not qualify for our public school district's GATE program going into 4th grade. The ONLY criteria they base it on is the Naglieri, which worried me a bit b/c it's such narrow criteria. I got her Naglieri test scores and she missed the district's cut off by one point. I subsequently requested admission to the GATE program by providing the district with multiple supporting documentation including her professionally administered IQ test (in between HG-EG) and achievement testing (demonstrating she's a minimum of 2 grade levels ahead in all academic subjects), and her admittance letter to the highly gifted private school in our area (which we declined entrance to for a multitude of reasons). They are still denying her, saying it's only based on the Naglieri, and that the teachers are trained in differentiation and will meet her needs, and that she can retest this coming spring with either the Naglieri or the OLSAT. Technically, she's accelerated one grade b/c she got caught in the first year of the TK transition in CA, and missed the cut off by 10 days. She attended TK but I spent that entire year advocating for her to move from TK - 1st grade the following year, which they allowed after reviewing the above-mentioned test scores, and evaluating her in the classroom- and for which I am grateful. But she still easily masters the curriculum, is always hungry for more, and exhibits all of the classic traits of gifted children. Anyone else been through this? It's so frustrating that this is the only criteria they use.

I'd suggest starting by reviewing your state's laws regarded gifted education, then go to the department of education for your state to find out what they recommend for identifying advanced students. With that information, you can decide if there is grounds to "go up the chain of command" to challenge their decision.

Looks like this is decided purely on a local school district basis, as state GT programming was part of the ed law repealed as of fall 2014:

http://www.cde.ca.gov/sp/gt/gt/gatefaqs.asp

Of course, multiple sources of information are always recommended when making placement decisions, but districts can and do make their own choices.

This is what your state recommends:

http://www.cde.ca.gov/sp/gt/gt/documents/guidebook.doc

Thanks so much for the recommendation. Yes, I am looking into that now. I've found on the CA BofE site that recommends "best practices" be based on multiple criteria, including IQ test and achievement testing. But I am still unclear about whether the "multiple criteria" evaluations are mandated. Interestingly, we have a brand new superintendent who comes from a CA district that evaluates for GATE based on multiple criteria. I will go to him if I have to. Also, interestingly, when I was advocating for my daughter's acceleration from TK-1st grade, our sup at the time was also brand new. Everyone at the district had told me their policy was no acceleration. At that point I consulted the BofE rules and found that acceleration is "at the discretion of the superintendent." I walked into the new sup's office and presented him with the BofE guidelines. He couldn't deny me at that point, opened my case, and my daughter was evaluated and accelerated. Seems like history is about to repeat itself. At least I have practice in this arena!

Unfortunately there is no mandate in California. The fairly new Local Control Funding Formula now gives school districts all the control on gifted education. The previous education code that spelled out minimum standards is gone. LCFF is a double edged sword because it lets districts design their own gifted education programs (or not), depending on the district that control could be good or it could be bad. You might have to get involved with your local Local Control Accountability Plan (LCAP) planning team to get any changes. Districts are required to get stakeholder input, however they are not required to implement it. But if you have an in with the Superintendent then I say work that angle .

I don't know what your GATE program is like, but GATE programs aren’t necessarily best practices for gifted education. The testing criteria in place may be testing for the criteria of the program and not necessarily for identifying gifted children.

Thanks everyone, for the valuable info. I know about the LCAP, etc., and am on the district's GATE committee - in fact, I formed the district's GATE committee. But I am wondering if anyone else has had this situation - an identified gifted child who didn't qualify for a program based solely on Naglieri scores.

Thanks for everyone's input. Our administrative offices are closed for a couple of weeks, but as soon as they open again, we'll be at their door. Has anyone else's child taken the Naglieri and had similar results? Wherein the scores are high (or maybe even not that high) and not completely reflective of that child's level of giftedness?

Hello. Yes, my son took Naglieri and had marginal results, despite having tested HG on WISC IV less than two years prior. I had my son privately tested (WISC IV) at age 6yr8mos. He was at a private, somewhat alternative, school at the time and not in the public school system and his teachers/admin were the ones advocating him to skip 1st grade, so I wanted test results before doing that (he was a late July birthday and I held him back, and I should not have!). He skipped 1st, went on to excel in 2nd and 3rd grade with ease.
I was going to transfer him to the local public school for 4th grade (his private school only went up to 3rd). The school district allowed him to sit for its gifted testing, which is Naglieri only, and as I mentioned, he score was marginal (like 70's). He did not seem confused, tricked, stressed, etc. I discussed this with the WISC test administrator (well known, highly respected) and he suggested I advocate and provide the WISC results...truly believed that individual results on an indepth test were more reliable than a 30 minute group Naglieri test. I discussed with the school and bottom line, it would have been an uphill battle to get the school to consider outside results. I should comment that my school district is very small, well funded, and very highly rated, but it does not put resources into GATE. In fact, the consistent feedback I got from administrators when my older DD attended our public middle school for 2 years was 'our regular curriculum and standards are so high there is no need for GATE. GATE is no different'. To me, that Naglieri is the only test administered to determine giftedness, represents how much the district 'believes' in GATE...the answer is, not much. Naglieri is cheap and easy to administer, and I believe that's why it is used. In fact, our district only tests the students whose parents request their child sit for it...is that the case in your district ? This is different than my old district, where Naglieri is used as a general screening tool for the entire population, i.e. Naglieri test is given to all students for gifted screening purposes in 1st grade and again in 5th grade. And if a student did not score above the cutoff to qualify for 'round 2' testing, which was the OLSAT, the parent and teacher could still request the 2nd round testing. Of note, My oldest DD only scored 90 when she took the Naglieri in our old district, but based on teacher recommendation went on to take OLSAT and scored very high. She was re-tested a few years later here by a private test administrator in CA (WISC IV) with results of borderline HG/EG on that as well. Clearly, the Naglieri result was not indicative of her ability. That our prior district had a system for 2nd round testing for those who did not meet cutoff for Naglieri suggests to me that not all school districts consider it inherently the 'best tool' for identifying giftedness. In fact, no one was placed in a gifted program based on Naglieri alone, in our old district. It was a screening test- that's it.

So, there you have it - two stories where I'd say Naglieri results were completely off base compared to individual results.

End result: I decided not to do battle with our elementary school to get my son into GATE for 4th and 5th, knowing that our middle school is not where he would attend thereafter. I sucked it up and sent my son to a private school with IB curriculum for 4th grade instead. He did extremely well and his teacher provided him many options for accelerated material, as it was obvious that he needed it. It is frustrating (and expensive) to opt out of our public school system but I knew I would be spinning my wheels.

If you are comfortable doing so, please PM me your school district...I am in SoCal and would be interested to know if we are in the same district. I hold out hope that I can send my son to our HS some day, though my oldest DD ended up going to a private school out of town to better meet her needs. Good luck.

Okay, we had a similar experience. Except that my DS did not qualify for the Gifted Program on the OLSAT (our SoCal school district uses the OLSAT for screening and the NNAT (or similar non-verbal assessment, but mainly NNAT for group testing) for IQ.

My DS did not qualify for OLSAT in the 2nd grade, but OLSAT is a School Ability (Achievement) assessment. His 3rd grade teacher suggested he be assessed for giftedness. I spoke to a friend who has a PG child and she said that the school might find that he was gifted but I wouldn't get the information that would explain his anxiety, etc. When the GATE office said they might not be able to assess the kids at our school that year, I didn't want to wait any longer and had him assessed privately. He tested HG for his GAI but with very slow processing that brought him down to MG on the WISC IV. Two weeks later they told us he would be assessed by school district. For the school district's test (they used the NNAT 2 in a group setting) he did not qualify as gifted- he was 91%. We appealed based on the WISC results and they said that they would retest him, however I requested an individual comprehensive assessment (measures both verbal and non-verbal). On the individual comprehensive assessment (KABC) he was assessed as Highly Gifted Applicable (99.7%). We are also in a SoCal school district. However our district does have multiple ways of identifying giftedness, not just IQ, but they will use IQ results for Highly Gifted school admission only, and they only usually allow a child to be assessed once for IQ.

I see that you have already appealed, and they have shut you down. I would go up the ladder until you get someone with some common sense. It makes no sense that she is that close to the cutoff and that after you have provided multiple supporting evidence to support your claim that she should be in the gifted program that they should continue to put you off.

Thanks for your continued responses. An update: the Asst Sup who shut down my appeal has since left the district. Plus we have a new superintendent who comes from a SoCal district that uses multiple criteria. We are meeting with him tomorrow.

Two additional developments:

1) we received my DD's SBAC (standardized test) results and she scored nearly perfect on both literacy and math. (2600 out of 2623 max score on literacy, 2595 out of max score 2621 on math). I know this measures knowledge and not intelligence, but it demos that she has exceeded the curriculum - bear in mind that she's accelerated one year, and she still maxed out the scores.

2) I learned on Friday that not a single student in my daughter's class scored high enough to get into GATE. That tells me this test is missing kids b/c I know a few others who we all anticipated would qualify.

That leaves open the question: Do I advocate to get her into GATE if she's going to be the only one in her class?!? Or do I focus more on working directly with the teacher to cluster her and some of her classmates, despite not being technically in GATE, and get that teacher to give them the GATE coursework anyway.

Not sure how this will all play out, but we have our meeting with the sup tomorrow and I intend to share all my research on multiple criteria, plus my DD's scores on her private testing + SBAC. Hopefully, he'll see the light in that it seems the district has swung too far in the other direction and is now under identifying students who need and deserve these services.