Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy are you a gifted ed evangelical?

Having taken the full trip with DS 19 and nearly the full trip with DS 15 I'm of the same mindset as HowlerKarma. My original mindset was that all it would take to sway people was to educate them, I quickly learned (and should have already known) that you can only educate those willing to be educated. What I've found is that there are too many who don't know what they don't know but assume they do. There are also many that assume that since little or no time was spent on gifted education and it's special needs in their college education, that anything you have to say or show them isn't going to be helpful or change their mind.

I've taken the mindset of educating those who will listen and avoiding those who won't. You can only justify wasting so much time on those who already have their mind made up, time that can be better spent seeking other options. I know I've wasted more time being bull headed trying to educate those who don't want to be than I'd like to admit.

I haven't ever been involved in the private school trail, only public school option. There, unfortunately I've learned a couple of things generally speaking, of course not in ALL cases...

1. The squeaky wheel gets the grease, not always but if it's not squeaking it has no chance.
2. Public schools are deathly afraid of any parental confrontation be it entirely civil, factual, and with intent to solve problems or otherwise.
3. If the public school even has the slightest thought pattern that something will cost more money they dismiss it immediately without so much as discussion.
4. You're not going to win over an entire system, if you can find one person who "gets" your kid and the concept, then do everything you can to make the most of it.
5. Expect to supplement your child's education outside of school and expect to need to go to great lengths to do so.

Again, these aren't true in ALL scenarios, they're just more often true than not.