Polarbear
The simple answer is they could but don't becasue two competing school types and ideas merged here - regular gifted programs, the kind that serves the optimally gifted who need enrichment and maybe a bit of acceleration versus programs designed to serve those beyond optimal perhaps even pg.
The history lesson! The current NYC system does was created in response to needs other than what would seem obvious to most. Basically, in the "old" days kids were separated into gifted classes and non gifted classes at different levels depending on the school or district. Usually one per grade. The placement was primarily teacher recommendation and some state testing. So of course it was subject to subjectivity and beahvior, I'm sure there were scenarios where bright problem children were not getting what they needed. But this was before mayoral control and centralization, so classically some programs served gifted needs better. This was coupled with the fact that there was little done for the younger set, the it's not necessary until 3rd grade view, so the gifted ones will take care of themselves until they could test for Hunter in 6th, and the the big 3 Styvesant, Bronx Science and Brooklyn Tech for HS. In the 80s they started to add other specialized high schools but no change was made for the little ones. Basically unless you lived in Manhattan you had no options for little kids ready for more. And in Manhattan Hunter only had 50 slots. So in the 1990s a group of parents who's kids made the test cutoff for Hunter but didn't get in started a new gifted program in a public school on the Hunter model, complete with SB testing and interviews. But where Hunter is run by CUNY and can do what it wants, this program was in a public school using public money and so naturally there was a lawsuit or threat of one regarding admissions, and two more schools were started with similar approaches and testing, trying to identify the advanced kids. But at some point in the 2000s, with first Guliani and then Bloomberge centralizing control and decisions across districts the DOE decided that it needed to standardize the entrance process because low income needed equal access to these elem specialized programs and/or non favorite kids needed options in the non specialized local gifted programs. So enter the one size fits all system where 90 percent gets you your local gifted program and 97 percent gets you access to the specialized elem programs.
So with that history lesson, the problem is that the number of seats available actually fluctuates because of the non educational aspect of this. A lof of people suspect or claim that the DOE creates gifted programs to bring in middle and upper middle class parents to poorer performing schools which then in turn raises the test scores and increases the money raised and parent involvement. And then they phase out the gifted program because the school is now considered sought after. They actually did this last year in the middle of the ranking portion of the application creating a huge putcry from affected parents forcing a redo. Others believe this is simply about options, the GT citywides have lots of options, again because of fundraising and an active parent body. So the cynics then argue that the cutoffs are where they are to raise the hopes and satisfy that upper middle class cohort. You really can't escape the financial side of it. They can't afford to administer WISC or SB 5, so they went with the cheapest, which could still be claimed to be equitable but then the prepping charges started. So the testing system does reach more kids becasue bias to recommend testing diminishes but there are still many more kids who qualify in the wealthier areas,producing a lake woebegone effect where everyone is above average, because the expensive preschools are doing worksheets and letters and the parents are doing workbooks.
This shows the breakdown by district in NYC Without knowing anything you can see there is huge imbalance, and again without knkwing can suspect they relate to all the things people always talk about.
On hoagies and here there is a lot of discussion of what do gifted kids of what level need - and the system in NYC does not address that at all. There is no skipping here and district programs lump 90 and up together. Obviously a 99 percenter and a 90 percenter have vastly different needs yet they will both be in a gifted classroom, getting "enrichment". In the districts with so many 99s these local classes are filled by 99s who don't get into the citywides then bumping the 98, 97 and below into gen Ed. That's where the ire comes from. Although its why those regular schools in those districts are highly regarded.
So the real dilemma is for the 98 or even 99 in a crappy district, they will not be in a defacto gifted class becasue there aren't enough other kids, so as the outlier or small group of outliers they get dispersed into the population and deal with all the issues familiar to most here.
But what really diminishes this system is the lack of belief in the test or in the need. Those with outlier kids desperately need acceleration, are all NYC 99s outliers in the DYS sense no, but they have very different needs. So should all 99s be guaranteed a spot, I think yes, But that chart gives the difficulty, last year 2700 qualified with 97, this year 4200 did, where do they put them, we don't yet know many of these are 99s but it's more than the 400 citywide spots. So just create more, there is never an explanation why the citywides cannot be expanded beyond space, which is obviously not a satisfying response to a parent who was shut out.
I can clearly go on all day about this!!
DeHe