Hello everyone,
I'm a very grateful lurker of this list and am hoping someone may be able to answer my question.

My DS8 will be taking the EXPLORE in a few months. I'm wondering if I should do anything in the way of preparing him. We haven't done much preparing for other tests as we didn't feel the need to. But I'm a little worried that he might feel bad if he doesn't do as well as he thinks he can on this one. Although this isn't his first above-grade-level test, it will be the most challenging that we've signed him up for so far.

If you did prepare your child for the EXPLORE, what did you use? Did you use materials to prepare all subtests or only specific ones?

Would appreciate your thoughts. Thank you very much for reading this!

We didn't prep beyond just reviewing the small packet the test company sent a few weeks before the test. I wanted dds to be familiar with the general directions and how to fill in bubbles on a scantron form (especially dd10 b/c she had never taken a test of that sort).

My dd10 didn't even want to do that much, so prep for her was really, really limited. Dd12, when she took it in 4th grade, felt that the prep materials they sent were not reflective of the actual difficulty of the test. i.e. -- she felt that it was harder than the prep booklet that came from the publisher.

We're going to focus on form and test-taking skills. Our DS7.5 needs to be able to better manage his time so we'll probably give him a little bit of guidance and maybe take a sample section or something. But we are also scheduled for the Jan test. (I think it's Jan.)

If anyone has good links to sample sections, we'd definitely appreciate it.

JB

My twins took the EXPLORE last year at 10 yo through NUMATS, and we did practice as they had not done scantron tests before. We were impatient waiting for the sample tests from NUMATS and tracked them down on the ACT website. I created a mock scantron form on the computer and printed off copies for their answers. We did our practice on a quiet, relaxed morning at home during winter break. We timed the tests - a fraction of the actual test time, in proportion to the number of questions on the practice test relative to the actual test. Our ds is very, umm, *reluctant*, shall we say, to stop an activity if he feels *he* is not ready to stop, so we felt this aspect of a timed test was important to practice. Also, we bribed them - a few minutes of extra computer time for giving it their all on the practice. I think it was worth doing the practice. They were both at ease going into the actual test, and both scored very well.

This is the only link I've found so far:
http://www.actstudent.org/explore/tests/index.html

My DS has completed all the samples but I seriously don't think they are reflective of the actual test or I'm certain they would have been more difficult than they were for him.

I hope this helps.

Thank you for your reply Cricket2 and amylou. Yes, I'm also concerned about that, Cricket2. That the packet will not reflect the actual difficulty. The ones we printed off the website were very easy for him. My DS actually enjoys workbooks and filling in bubbles (go figure!). He will do anything happily as long as it is on his own terms and he wants to try a test prep workbook. I'm considering getting one of those for 8th graders. Does anyone have suggestions? Amazon shows a few types...by Barrons, Spectrum etc.

Thanks again.

The actual test may be harder than the practice test, but our interest in the practice was to get used to the *format* of the exam. As for the content, we expected the actual test to challenge them, and told them to expect that. It was designed for 8th graders after all, and they were only 4th graders at the time.

As it turned out, dd found both the practice and actual test to be easy, and had time to spare for every section, both in the practice and actual exam.

Ds is our more erratic test taker - he had one subtest score on the EXPLORE that was not as high as the others and said he ran out of time on that section. A similar thing happened with his state testing, but it was a different subject area that came out lower on that one.

Thanks Amylou! It's good to hear about your children's experiences. Would love to hear from anyone else who's had their 3rd/4th grader take the EXPLORE.

My son took Explore in 3rd grade. We did no prep other than the practice questions. I warned him that it might be hard and was designed for older kids. He thought it was fun but tiring.

I think it's worth discussing time management as some younger kids have a hard time finishing.

Thank you kaibab and thanks again to all who answered my questions!

DD took it at ages 9 and 10. We felt like "serious" prep would undermine what we wanted her to get out of it, so we didn't do a lot. The one thing we did both years was print out practice sections for math and have her work for 30 minutes (one practice each year). The goal there was just to give her a feel for time management since she'd never had to skip a problem or manage her time on state tests. It didn't generalize well enough for her to actually manage her time on the EXPLORE (but that's a longer post ). I do think it probably allowed her to participate on test day without freaking out after not finishing a section. If you are prepping for that reason, I'd suggest ignoring the EXPLORE sample items and instead googling "released test items" and 8th or 10th grade (whichever will have problems on it that your kiddo might not know). That will allow you to print out a longer set of problems that may be slightly more representative of the type of work on the test. I chose to print out more problems than she could possibly finish in the 30 minutes and made sure there were problems she couldn't do yet. I prefaced the practice time by talking to her about identifying when she should skip and come back to a problem, and that was the extent of the follow up conversation too. We only checked accuracy on problems that weren't guesses--I didn't want to do "instruction" as prep, again, because that would have undermined what we personally wanted from the test. The exception was that I was willing to explain unfamiliar vocabulary since she sometimes had the concept but hadn't been exposed to the specific vocabulary of it.

Good idea. Our results on going to depend somewhat on the boy's mood that day. If he's in slow-mo mode, we're just not going to get great results. We definitely want him to get a sense of the time management part... so thanks for that suggestion.

JB

Thank you Taminy! He will be very sad if he doesn't finish a subtest on time. Thank you so much for the excellent suggestion. I will start googling right away!

DId anyone else's child (or did everyone else's child) take a one page, double-sided questionnaire on Intelligence before the Explore test?

My son said that it was more like a personality survey. "Choose things that you are good at." Not specific to intelligence according to him.

JB

My dd said it had to do with opinions about how Intelligence is increased. She said she was not sure what the data would be used for.

I just heard from dd that the survey asked the kids to id if they were more gifted in math/science, reading/writing, both, or something else. And do they do math at school, online, in classroom, in a small group, or in a higher level classroom. From what the kiddo said, it sounded like it might have something to do with perception of intelligence/talents. Or, that's what I interpreted from her description.

She took the Explore today in OH via Numats.

My feathers are a little ruffled about this questionnaire, which was formally given by the proctor. The one my daughter filled out had 8-10 questions all regarding her perception/beliefs about intelligence and if it could be changed. She rated each question along the continuum from strongly agree to strongly disagree.

It seems to me that our kids were used as part of someone's psych experiment. And the fact that they even mentioned the word intelligence before this test is a huge deal. Wondering if they give this before every Explore test?

I'm not sure why this little survey would ruffle feathers. My daughter said it didn't ask anything off the wall. Why would using the word "Intelligence being used before a test be a huge deal?

If they want our kids to participate in a psychological survey or study, we should be notified as parents and sign a consent form. My oldest dd, when she was in 6th grade, participated in a survey at school given to kids who were ided as gifted in math. We had to read some info on the intent of the study and sign waivers. IRB/human subjects review usually requires that.

Agreed. I would have liked to know ahead of time. If I hadn't read this board, I doubt I would have ever heard about it. I vaguely remember that there might be an interests survey, but this sounds different.

Asking about intelligence before taking a test would be a big deal because there is evidence that priming subjects can significantly impact their testing performance.

What type of effect: negative or positive? I'm totally not on board with this questionnaire, but I guess that I am unsure on what they were primed on. Can you clarify?

Cricket2,

The direction of the effect varies depending on the subjects' pre-existing level of test anxiety and the nature of the priming - whether the questions tend to reinforce self-perceptions of competence vs. incompetence, internal vs. external locus of control, etc.

http://www.allacademic.com/meta/p_mla_apa_research_citation/1/1/2/8/8/p112882_index.html

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20435953

Yeah, that wouldn't be a good one for my dd10 as she already has an external locus of control issue going.

If I had been asked ahead of time if it would be ok to ask my child a series of questions on her perception of intelligence right before a test which is meant to challenge her the answer would have been NO.

Just one sentence about intelligence has been shown to affect a child's willingness to tackle new, difficult things.

Intelligence is the last thing I would have wanted her thinking about before an out of grade level test.

I suppose for some testers, it could be an issue. It never occured to me with my dd as she isn't a kid who stresses over testings.

This a tangential thought but perhaps related:
In the 1970's, maybe you remember the show "Archie Bunkier." Carroll O'Connor was a white, lower-income bigot. His jokes about bigotry seem silly and obviously jokes.
However, when they did polls/research on the issue, they found that:
1) If you were not prejudiced, you saw the show for what it was- making fun of racists like Archie.
2) If you were a prejudiced person, seeing Archie Bunker be a racist reinforced those stereotypes. THose people thought they were watching a reality show and that it was okay to be a racist.

Any recollection where you might have heard about the "interests survey"? I don't remember anything about that when I signed my dd up, but it was a late-night task. Who knows what I might have glossed over...

What I remember was something about matching up interests, summer programs, and scholarship opportunities. Whatever I read, it was probably something I found online last summer when I was first researching Explore. It could have been for a different talent search. I haven't been able to find it again with Google. Does anyone want to call Numats?

I can't see how answers to these survey questions would help them plan any kind of program for our students.

I don't want to blow it out of proportion, but it just seems so very wrong to me for several reasons...

Glad I saw this. I just asked DS9 who took the Jan. date, and he said there was a survey before that asked questions about what he is good at. Upon a little more questioning, he said it asked things such as are you more gifted in x vs. y (what someone else posted).

He doesn't stress out over testing, but regardless, I am pretty surprised they didn't get consent. This doesn't sound like an "interests" survey to me. I'm looking forward to hearing from Herenow after she gets some further information. What is interesting is that this seems to be included with all the Explore test sites, not just one individual talent search.

Cat

I would like to know what exactly the questions were and how they were worded, and what are they going to be used for. I would have been much less bothered if it had been completed after the Explore test rather than before the test. My DD appears to have keyed into the word intelligence on the survey too. I'm looking forward to hearing the response since this sounds more like something done for Explore itself if it was done with different talent search groups.

But if they had done it after the test then the their survey would have been biased by the experience of having taken the Explore, instead of having the test be biased by their survey. You wouldn't want that would you ...

I'm also surprised they'd do that, especially sneaking it in without informing anyone. DD took it last month and I'll ask her about it.

My dd was, honestly, sick on the day of the EXPLORE so I'm not expecting her best performance. She had an upset stomach and headache, but we figured that we'd give it a try since it was the last test date and there wasn't anything specific going on other than her saying that she didn't feel well. By the time I picked her up, she had a temperature, though.

That aside, she did confirm that they were asked similar questions. The one she remembered was, "you can change your intelligence: strongly agree, agree, neutral, disagree, strongly disagree." She said that there were a number of questions using a likert scale that dealt with a fixed vs. growth model of intelligence (she didn't word it that way ). I send an e-mail to WATS/CBK, our talent search, to ask them to look into this since no informed consent was gathered.

I think I found what you might have read. On the EXPLORE website it mentions that the students would take a "72 item interests inventory about the types of work tasks you would or would not like to do".

That is not what our kids were given. The questionnaire our kids took had maybe 8 questions on intelligence and whether is is fluid or fixed, all exactly as Cricket2 described. They were all variations on a theme. For example I think they went something like this:

Intelligence can be changed if you work hard
1agree 2 3 4 5 disagree

No matter how hard someone works they can't change their intelligence.
1 agree 2 3 4 5 disagree

And so on for several more questions. The children were told "there are no wrong answers, just your opinion". The end of the questionnaire had a few more questions; I don't know what they were. The questionnaires at our site were sitting on the tables when the children walked into the room. They were told not to fill them out until instructed.

I will be very surprised if this isn't going into someone's psych study. Without our consent. While possibly affecting our kids scores/perception of testing. And we PAID for this.

I am curious whether they gave this questionnaire to the 8th graders who take this test. Or was it just given to the Gifted kids?

Better go take a walk and cool off...

The one question that my DD thought she remembered clearly (tested last month, just asked her last night) was along the lines of "are you better at math/science or at reading/english", with some kind of option of saying equal. If she is remembering right, then that is a bit annoying since you could be causing the kid to focus on "I'm not as good at math" or something like that right before the test.

When my oldest took Explore through our talent search (not NUMATS), we had to check a box saying we would allow a survey to be given regarding academic interests. I don't recall the exact wording. I would think if NUMATS asked you when you signed up, that would constitute consent. If not, I agree that's wrong.

Historically, the talent searches grew out of social psychologists trying to study gifted kids. As I understand it, that was Julian Stanley's original mission at JHU. The head of our talent search is a psychology professor, and has published quite a bit of research from the data gathered through the talent search.

Hopefully, this research will help educators understand our kids. I'm all for it. I agree consent is an issue.

My dd12 is an 8th grader and took the EXPLORE at her school "for real" this past October. She wasn't given a survey of that sort.

Hmmmm...Interesting....My ds10 took the EXPLORE February 19th. He never mentioned a pretest "survey" of any type until I asked him just now. He said there were about eight questions asking what special gifted classes he was taking, how he felt about taking the test, what reason was he taking the test...He did do the practic questions they sent. On the practice test he felt math was the hardest and the science pretty easy, but on the actual test he said math was much easier than the practice test questions and that the science was much harder....Go figure

when taking the SCAT another above grade level test I failed to tell him it would be hard. He came out of the math portion CRYING since he did not know everything. I felt so bad.
I wish I would have prepared him by telling him that it would be a hard test and that he was not expected to know everything.
He did do well enough to make it into CTY though but got a lot wrong.

Dd12 had that same response when she took the EXPLORE @ age 9 (4th grade). The school wanted above level scores as part of an IAS although they approved the skip prior to the scores coming in. Reading is normally one of her strongest areas but she didn't come close to finishing it b/c she left the room three times to go to the bathroom and cry during that section since she was far enough into the test by that point to realize that it was hard and she didn't know it all.

For kids used to knowing it all taking a hard test where they are not expected to know it all is not easy to explain.
And I felt like looked like the crazy parent forcing my kid to take this test when he came out hysterical. I did not expect that. So now for TIP I am not sure I will have him take the EXPLORE test. There is no reason to have him take it so I think we will skip it for now.

Has anyone heard anything back from their talent search re the survey? WATS/CBK hasn't yet responded to my e-mail.

Would it be the talent search or ACT?

edited.

I contacted our talent search. Has anyone contacted ACT directly to inquire? I still haven't gotten a reply e-mail from CBK (the talent search).

Hi. My DS10 took the test this spring. I'm also a little weirded out by the questions. I called ACT this morning and they referred me to the talent search (Duke TIP).

I called Duke and they told me that all the talent searches used this survey to "better know the kids they're serving". He is supposed to send me an email with the exact questions that were asked.

I called ACT this morning as well and was told basically the same thing -- the questionnaire must have come from the talent search not from ACT. CBK isn't answering their phone at all and hasn't responded to my e-mail. I'm a little irritated to put it lightly. IMHO if we didn't consent to this, they have no right to be conducting experiments on our kids. These aren't "how old are you, where do you attend school," types of questions that could be interpretted as a means of getting to know the kids better. It sounds like a means of getting to know the kids' psychology better and seeing how that correlates with their test performance. That would constitute a human subjects experiment which requires IRB approval and signed consent forms from parents.

Tips on Informed Consent

http://www.socialpsychology.org/consent.htm

I realize that the wagons are probably circling here as we are likely stressing out the talent search programs as to our intentions given that they didn't follow IRB protocol. For me, the fact that I am not getting any response is making the problem significantly worse. Some response -- even a 'we are looking into whether we messed up and need to apologize and change tactics' -- is better than being ignored.

I can call numats Monday. I may not be the voice of reason right now.

Given that most of the major talent searches have now been called by one of us, they are starting to figure out that people know and are not happy. I suspect the directors of the various centers are trying to connect and figure out what happened and formulate a response. It would be my hope that one of them could post here and let us know what happened, and how they intend to respond and change things for the future (i.e. get IC and give the survey after the test).

I very much value our GT centers and organizations, and the various talent searches, and don't want anyone's head. It would go a long way, however, for them to be forthcoming with information, a plan, and if appropriate, an apology.

Cat

Good point.

For anyone whose child took the Explore test in years past do you have any idea if your child got a "survey" before the test? I know it's been a while, but any recollections you or your child might have could be helpful.

Dd12 can't recall but I expect that her more recent experiences with taking the SAT and ACT through talent search as well as the EXPLORE at school this year are fresher in her mind. As she told me, they couldn't give out those types of surveys during the SAT/ACT talent search testing b/c most of the kids in on those testings aren't talent search kids and it would be offensive and weird to ask only the talent search kids about intelligence while ignoring the high school students who are there as well.

I've probed dd10 a bit more as to what the survey entailed and she recalls four types of questions:

* her opinion about whether you can change your intelligence
* her opinion about which subjects she is better in (math vs. reading, for instance)
* what subjects she thinks her parents or teachers think she is best in
* what her class placement looks like for various subjects (pull-out, subject acceleration, etc.)

Of course, I'm not sure that her recall is perfect. She does think that the same type of survey was given last year when she took the EXPLORE, though.

I know DS was asked questions like that last year when he took the Explore. I'll have to ask him about this year. He said they did ask questions. Thinks like "what is your fav subject? What do you think you're smart in?" etc.

My DD said that last year she was asked questions at the end of the test, but this year they asked questions at the beginning of the testing session. She also said that they were given the questions in written form but that they were also read aloud.

Thanks everyone for telling us about your prior testing experiences. From what we have heard, it sounds like this instrument has been used for a couple years at least. This is purely a guess, but I wonder if they initially gave it after the test and informed parents via the "personality test" info that is currently discussed. Perhaps the questions morphed over time, and no one thought to change the consent (not suggesting this is okay, but understandable). If someone then failed to adequately instruct the proctors that the survey needed to be taken after the test, we could end up where we are, not via any intentional acts, but via a number of small oversights.

Once again, I hope one of the directors of an Explore talent search will post here with some summary of what they have found and propose. Perhaps if you are in touch with a Director via your own inquiries, you could tell them about this discussion thread, provide the url, and encourage them to post. I will do so as well.

Cat

I've communicated via email with our regional talent search at this point and spoken with someone at ACT who is in charge of the elementary student talent search. Our talent search region seems to be ambivalent about this survey as well and tells me that they shred and do not use the results.

The guy at ACT was a bit ruffled and said that the talent search regions were in charge of gathering IC and that, if this wasn't worked out, they would not be providing the Explore anymore for use in talent search.

Cricket,
Did they tell you what the questions entailed, regardless of who was supposed to obtain consent?

No, The man at ACT's ESTS (Elementary Student Talent Search) division told me that the survey wasn't their "intellectual property" and, as such, they couldn't get me any info about the content. He said that the survey was designed and implemented by the respective talent searches (WATS, C-MITES, NUMATS, etc.). The talent search region left me with the opposite impression -- that they weren't the ones who designed the survey or requested its administration.

Speaking of which--any idea when the scores start to come in? Dd keeps asking!

Deacongirl, I believe the scores come at the very end of March.

I spoke with the director of my talent search. She was very informative and helpful, and I would encourage anyone who has a question about the survey portion of the Explore test to call and ask to speak with their talent search director. I think speaking by phone is the most useful, as for this sort of thing it can be better medium for communication, and helps avoid misunderstandings, etc.

She indicated that the various talent searches created the survey some time ago and it is changed every few years, based on input from the talent searches. ACT only administers the survey. She agreed that there should be transparency in the process, and listened to my concerns.

The heads of the talent searches are probably meeting in May. I am satisfied with what she told me, although I am quite curious to see what the resolution will be.

After seeing this thread I asked my 4th grader about the survey yesterday. He remembered it from January, but the question that was most top-of-mind for him was "race". He's never been asked that before, so it really got him wondering why they cared. Also, he's mixed race and didn't know what to answer. He told me he was worried someone might want the info to stalk him (too many Internet safety conversations, I guess) so he left it blank. How's that for a great way to kick off a testing session! Poor kid. I'm guessing it was a new question since he took it last year, too, but made it seem like this year was the first time he was asked his race.

To all who have participated in this discussion regarding talent search and the �survey�

My name is Susan Assouline and I am the associate director of The University of Iowa Belin-Blank Center. Ann Shoplik (C-MITES Director) and I were the first to use EXPLORE as a talent search instrument, thus were one of the original founders of the Elementary Student Talent Search (ESTS). Because the Belin-Blank Center and ACT are both in Iowa City � and also share a history � I�ve worked closely with them over the past 20 years, and �d like to provide a bit of history and also clear up some misconceptions.

History: The very first elementary student talent search (ESTS) was conducted in Jan 1993. At that time, ACT informed the Belin-Blank Center that each answer sheet for EXPLORE had 12 blank items � called Local Items, because they are developed locally � and that the Belin-Blank Center could develop 12 short-item questions, which would be administered prior to the actual 4 EXPLORE tests. We did so. Now, this was in 1993, and the information about human subjects, IRB, etc., was much less formal than it is now. However, I assure you, this was not a personality test. The original items were along the lines of: How much do you like school; how much do you like math; how much do you like Language Arts, etc., etc., etc. What do we learn:
In general, bright children love school, but their �love� diminishes a bit as their grade level increases. Children love math and science . . . they do not like language arts.

We found this information to be very useful in program planning.

Shortly after 1993, other talent search organizations opted to also use EXPLORE. Those directors can give you additional history about their organizations. Over the years, those 12 local items have changed � perhaps 4 or 5 times. The changes have been based upon the interests of the various talent search organizations and involve many compromises. A few years back, we wanted to know the most common ways in which students studied various subjects. My colleague, Ann Shoplik, and I obtained permission from the other talent search organizations to have ACT generate the frequency distribution of the one local item that asked about the ways in which students study math because we used that information in our book, Developing Math Talent, relative to information about programming. BTW � 50% of talent search participants study math in the regular classroom setting. Think about the implications of students at the 95th percentile � or above � on grade-level tests studying math in the regular classroom. However, other than reporting this percentage as it pertains to programming (you don�t need IRB approval for collecting data related to programming), we have not reported any other statistics, because we do not have IRB permission.

You may be wondering why we haven�t published anything about the local items recently .. . in fact one parent said, � It seems to me that our kids were used as part of someone's psych experiment . . . .
However, that is not the case; primarily, we have not � because no one has permission from their respective IRBs -- analyzed or published any analyses. The University of Iowa is working on getting IRB approval for the students who register for ESTS through the UI. But we do not have permission. Until we get permission, we cannot even look at the frequencies of responses . . . let alone write it up . . .

Speaking of IRB, I want to share the reality of university IRB system. I have been working with the research dept at ACT to �hopefully � conduct a small study with 200 students who will be part of a special testing in Iowa in March. I submitted the IRB proposal on Jan 21. Preparing the IRB is no small task. After receiving the IRB proposal, I received 23 questions that required responses. I responded. After responding to those 23, I received 14 more queries. After responding to those � keep in mind that there are usually several days between queries and response � I received 6 more. Finally, I got permission � two months after submitting the proposal, only to be told by ACT, that the proposed study could not be conducted using the procedure. That means that the original consent form, which had specified a specific procedure for distribution of the survey,will need modification. So, it's back to IRB . . .

Now, given all of the above information, I want to say that we really do respect all of the concerns and fully recognize that times have changed and there needs to be more transparency. We will be working towards this. I regret that the time it takes for universities to �act� is so unbelievably long.

This message is already too long, so I will post another response regarding some of the other concerns mentioned in this discussion.

For those of you who read this entire message, thank you.

This is my thinking and I do not have the endorsement of any of the other talent search organizations for any of the content above.

This item is PURELY an item that is from ACT. It is part of the standard answer sheet.

Dr. Assouline, While I do appreciate your response on this thread, I am not comfortable with the IRB explanation you gave. I understand that IRB processes are cumbersome. That is not a reasonable explanation for simply not seeking IRB approval for me.

While I do have some familiarity with IRB and am researching more, I do also want to clarify something related to your post. You stated that you have not published statistics from the local items survey b/c you did not get IRB approval. Are you saying that informed consent of parents and IRB approval is only necessary if you plan on publishing results from your survey?

I admit that I may be wrong, but that was not my understanding of IC/IRB. I had thought that IC and IRB approval was necessary to conduct a human subjects experiment (including surveying children on their beliefs about intelligence, etc.) not just if you want to use the results of the experiment for publication.

Thanks for the opportunity to clarify. I'm not sure what you are referring to in terms of an IRB explanation. Did you mean my comment: "Now, given all of the above information, I want to say that we really do respect all of the concerns and fully recognize that times have changed and there needs to be more transparency. We will be working towards this. I regret that the time it takes for universities to �act� is so unbelievably long."

If so, then please recognize that my phrase: "we will be working toward this" is exactly what I believe you are suggesting: we will be obtaining IRB.

Thanks for asking for clarification about publication of statistics, etc., and specifically for the question:
"informed consent of parents and IRB approval is only necessary if you plan on publishing results from your survey"

When parents register their child for the talent search testing, they provide consent. We made an assumption that the consent was for the entire testing process, which in my mind, included the local items. There was no malice intended in this. However, when some parents brought this to our attention, we recognized that this needs to be remedied, thus, we have filed IRB proposals retroactively.

So, you please understand: you did consent. However, because there is confusion about what was actually consented to, we cannot conduct research until IRB approves a proposal.

So, please understand, the clarity needs to be with respect to the talent search program. The talent search program is NOT an experiment. It is a program and parents consent to it prior to registering their child. We now recognize that we need to fully disclose the information related to the local items (my discussion of the history of this was intended to reveal to you that this was never intended to be an experiment or a intelligence test or personality test).

If any researchers from the talent search organizations are interested in looking at these results, they can only do so with IRB permission.

I hope that clarifies -- I do appreciate any requests to provide clarity to my comments.

Susan Assouline

That and your longer note about what is entailed in getting IRB approval:



I know it's a huge process. That doesn't mean that you don't have to do it.

I guess that I've just never seen it done this way -- research conducted prior to obtaining IRB and then seeking IRB after the fact. I recognize that there is a semantics issue here in that you are not terming it research, but we as parents (or at least I, as a parent) do feel like these questions were research into our children's psychological beliefs regarding fixed versus malleable intelligence.

I'll have to look back at the forms we filled out to register our children for talent search, but I do not recall there being any consent forms in there at all. Consent forms generally entail a full explanation of what your children will be doing and the talent search registration forms do not note anything about surveys of beliefs. That's like saying that us filling out school registration forms is the same as filling out a consent form to survey our children on similar items to what they were asked on the EXPLORE.

Here is the form I filled out to register my dd for WATS:
http://www.centerforbrightkids.org/static/pdfs/1011Application.pdf

The only consent statement says, "I hereby certify that this student meets the Western Academic Talent Search eligibility requirements for high performance/ability. I hereby give permission for participation in the Talent Search and understand that regardless of whether a test is taken, I am paying a non-refundable $43 application fee for processing and the additional benefits of this participation."

I don't take this to indicate that I am consenting to her being asked questions about what subjects she believes she is best in, what subjects the adults in her life thinks she is best in, and whether she thinks that she can change her intelligence.

I cannot comment on WATS procedures.

However, I agree with you.

For members of the Belin-Blank Talent Search, I regret that we did not explain that participating in the EXPLORE testing also includes the opportunity to answer 12 additional questions. This was an omission. It was not intentional. However, we will correct this on our consent forms for the future.

May I inquire as to the origin of this quote?

I also do want to clarify that I am not meaning any disrespect or to come across too forcefully here. I guess that I am just not okay with the 'we didn't do anything wrong' feel I am getting from everyone with whom I've spoken/e-mailed. I truly do not think that there was malice involved. However, one can admit that one screwed up without malice.

Okay, and someone else chime in here already !

It is beyond my comprehension how the "consent" we gave for our child to take the Explore test could possibly be considered "informed consent" (with all its rigors) for your studies.

I'm reading the Code of Federal Regulations Title 21 to indicate that informed consent is required whether you intend to publish or not:

Section 50:20 -- General requirements for informed consent
Except as provided in 50.23 and 50.24, no investigator may involve a human being as a subject in research covered by these regulations unless the investigator has obtained the legally effective informed consent of the subject or the subject's legally authorized representative. An investigator shall seek such consent only under circumstances that provide the prospective subject or the representative sufficient opportunity to consider whether or not to participate and that minimize the possibility of coercion or undue influence.

eta: FWIW, sections 50.23 and 50.24, as noted above, apply only in life threatening situations where physicians, for instance, have to try experimental procedures on a patient who will otherwise die.

As a university researcher, it is my understanding that data collection for "programming" rather than "research" still requires a request to the IRB for a "waiver." It would be reassuring to know that the IRB had given the okay for a waiver in this situation, in which case consent would not be needed. However, if the data was used in writing a book as indicated by Susan@BB, that constitutes publication and would not be allowed by the IRB at my institution, which grants waivers in some cases for data collected only for "internal" programming purposes.

Given the potential direct impact the kind of questions added to the Explore can have on a child's performance (see links Aculady provides on page 3 of this thread to research on "stereotype threat"), I think the talent searches should seriously consider dropping the additional 12 questions, with or without IRB approval. At the very least, how about putting the 12 questions at the end, to be answered only after the students have completed the achievement test, so that they will not affect performance?

It is not. We are not using the information.

The data were not used in writing our book. We commented regarding the programming of students.

The "research" potential from these items will never be realized because of this issue.

I guess we are all going to need to contact our individual testing centers to find out what each one is doing with their data. I am going to try to call NUMATS tomorrow.

I was told the same by WATS -- that they are not using the data. I am left wondering, though, why these items are being administered if no one is using the data and no one can even look at it without IRB approval.

It just seems like such a waste. Under different circumstances we would probably be the parents first in line to help with these topics. I would venture to say that most of us are highly appreciative of the Talent Searches and the opportunities they give to our children. Most of us have read enough research to understand how important the local questions were that you asked our children. We get it. This is valuable research, and it could directly impact our children.

I agree with this completely and I am sure that it is hard for Dr. Assouline to post here since I know that we're picking posts apart. This a bright bunch of parents, though, and I think trust between parents and the talent searches has been seriously breached at this point, unfortunately.

I know that I've been outspoken here but I am trying to be reasonable. I'm not advertising this issue elsewhere. I am worried about ramifications for my dds and I am not sure if we'll have dd10 participate in talent search in middle school as a result. Dd12 will be in high school next year, so it's a moot point for her.

I had a reassuring conversation with Numats earlier this week. They got back to me right away. I would urge others to call them if they are concerned about the questionaire.

Just a quick update --

I've been asked not to reference specific individuals with whom I've communicated, but I've been informed that all of the talent search programs that participate in EXPLORE had a conference call with ESTS last week and that they have jointly decided to cease administering the "local items" survey next year. They will all still be offering the EXPLORE.

I'm trying to figure out the level of math which is on the Explore test. I know it is administered to 8th graders, but exactly what does that mean in terms of the typical math progression. I am guessing pre-algebra, but maybe I'm way off....

The description on the website is pretty vague.

Any thoughts would be very appreciated.

according to my ds8 who took EXPLORE in February, math has a couple of algebra questions.