I know so many of us are in the same boat so I'm going to try to make this direct and to the point (is that possible?). I finally got to the point that I applied my DS10 to a private school that caters to bright and many gifted children (but also to an all around child with lots to offer and a VERY diverse population). He took the ISEE (which is just a portion of the admission process and with NO prep - I didn't want him to do any) and he did quite well considering many of these children study and prepare their interviews for a year - we difinitely winged it. So his scores were:
VR: 87%
RC: 82%
QR: 93%
MA: 85%

Well 2 days ago (he was waitlisted and decisions had been made 3 weeks ago) I got a letter from the testing center saying they mad a mistake scoring his exam. His RC score went from an 82% to a 99% !! So I called the school and there's pretty much nothing they could do - especially in the fact that out of the over 100 appications they were offering the 25 positions to mostly girls to even out the grade. So I'm stuck with the public middle school who do not believe in even acceleration. I have been fighting for the G&T program and differention for all students and have gotten some G&T but it is not near what my son needs. So I am done fighting for all the children and I am going to fight for just my child. What information should I go in with? Here are the scores I have along with the ISEE scores.

Measure of Academic Progress (MAP)
Math 257 (99%)
Reading 233 (97%)

COGAT
Verbal 99%
Quantitative 94%
Nonverbal 97%
Composite 99%


NJ ASK
Mathematics 300 (ceiling advanced proficient)
LAL 242 (high proficient)

WISC
VCI 132
PRI 143
WMI 146
PSI 141
FSIQ 141
GAI 146

Block Design 18
Digit Span 19
Matrix Reasoning 18

He is going to be taking the SCAT soon for CTY and the EXPLORE for a second test for DYS but I don't know if he's qualified enough to pass those and then I may lose my confidence to do this. He is bored stiff, has so much to offer and doesn't want to be the smart one any more. I could please use some advice on how to speak to the school and administrators - and it must be done in a firm way as I have tried every other way and they just don't believe in pushing any child ahead. As they said "If we push them ahead what are they going to take in high school?". I'm devastated. Sorry for being so long winded.

Jules

Hi Jules,

Are you open to subject/grade acceleration?

Can you tell me where in NJ you are (feel free to send a PM).

Cat

What they are going to take in high school is college-level courses through dual enrollment, frequently, or they might finish high school early and do early college entrance, or they might do advanced independent study projects with a mentor teacher through the district. It isn't like this is unusual. Thousands of children across the country do this every year. Or they might take a few years to travel or sail around the world or start a business or...whatever you and they decide to do when they get to that point, which is really none of this school's business. The school's job is to provide a free and appropriate education for your child right now.

Oh Yeah!

Exactly! That is not this school's problem, it is yours, and it is way down the road! There is no shortage of subject matter that is above high school level. They will not run up against a wall and have nothing left to learn in the future, and even if that were possible, it would still not be this school's concern.

Well, I have come to believe that when the school says they can't do anything it's not necessarily the full truth of the matter. Other folks somewhere in the system can literally do anything they think is necessary, if you can manage to figure out the system and get to those folks.

If there is a gifted program and you haven't had him apply, apply asap. Things go slow, so get used to that.
Look up as much as you can on the actual 'delivery of services' plan for identified gt students.

Find out all the options:

Teachers/admins here have said if a child is in the gt program that doesn't mean they'll accelerate in a subject (???), however it is listed on the delivery of services plan, so somebody somewhere is probably getting this as an option, why not your kid? (why not my kid?)

Good luck, he does have some great scores, sorry the other school option got messed up because of bad scoring.