I totally get what you are saying Tammy but I look at all these posts about parents meeting with the schools, trying to get appropriate programs. There is a lot of pushing going on to get the appropriate learning environments.
What if you lived in an area that wouldn't look at any scores except the OLSAT test. So your PG kid wouldn't get a shot at great accelerated program unless they scored in the 99th percentile (which has a poor correlation with IQ until later grades and they had to do this in pre-K). And then all the 99th scoring kids went into a lottery for those spots.
No amount of cajoling would change anything and you lived in a neighborhood where kids were struggling with learning to count 1-10 in K. What would you really do?
I guess that's my point. Having to compete to get an appropriate education is unacceptable. The idea that even if you "qualify", you have to leave it to the chance of a lottery, is unacceptable. The fact that under those conditions already disadvantaged kids are further disadvantaged because: a) they have had less enriching pre school experiences and b) they can't afford test prep or private testing, is unacceptable. I DON'T accept that that's how it has to be, and there are plenty of districts that don't sort kids based on a pre-kindergarten test.
Yes, a lot of people are having to advocate to get their kids' needs met, but I think test prep creates a circular problem. People prep their kids because they don't trust the schools to recognize their needs, the schools don't recognize their needs because they don't get giftedness and they think gifted programs are elitist, schools think gifted programs are elitist because they are faced with the fact that families who have the means are paying for test prep and--in their eyes--buying the outcomes they want.
I still maintain that prepping kids for ability tests invalidates the results unless there is a way to factor in that preparation. I understand that there may be a sense of need to do so if there are a lot of other people prepping their kids. Circular problem number two.
What would I do if I lived within such a district? As I said before, I'm glad I didn't have to make that choice.
I don't agree that budget cuts need to result in loss of services to gifted kids. Most educational strategies that are actually meaningful don't cost more (acceleration, clustering, guided independent studies), at least in a medium to large sized school or district. These kids need a teacher whether they are gifted or not, so it doesn't have to be more staff: it just has to be adequately prepared/educated staff. I don't believe that the difficulties we face in getting gifted kids' needs met are primarily financial, I think that the difficulties we face are philosophical. There is a widespread lack of understanding at the administrative, classroom AND parent levels that giftedness is something other than being a high achiever/good student. To me that's the real battle ground--and I would argue that for the reasons I've already given, test prep is a significant barrier to forward progress.
Simple solutions? None to offer....
