Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment Good schools/areas for PG kids...suggestions?

You may wish to look into the DYS program and sign up for a tour of Davidson Academy for 6th grade and beyond (which may come sooner than later if your child is accelerated in school).

I'm in the Boston area with a 2e/pg ds8. My son has attended two of the private gifted schools on Hoagie's - http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/schools.htm. He's now being un/homeschooled because neither school could accommodate him in terms of acceleration and there's really nothing else around. I spoke to Acera but they were newish (less than 5 years old) and would not have worked out.

Hoagie's does list US and international schools that you might consider. Please bear in mind, that with any of these schools, it really depends on the teachers, curriculum, ability to accelerate/accommodate, LOG, other students, etc. on whether your child will find a match. There's a lot of variables with schools and lot is going to depend how much your child will or will not tolerate in a particular school environment. Unfortunately, you don't always know how your child is going to react until they're placed in a particular school environment.

Many of the private gifted schools will accommodate a few grade skips or maybe more in one subject, but IF you've got a child working 4+ grades ahead across many subjects you may be out of luck. Some kids are fine being in a public/private school setting with modest accommodations. Others are not.

My advice would be to look at alternative schooling options online and all your options (even crazy ones) before ruling them out. There's a lot of free/open source un/homeschooling opportunities today that might work for the academics. Khan, BBC, Open U, and many, many others would offer both the flexibility and acceleration opportunities. There's also a number of virtual schools online (many fee-paying) which you might want to consider too before ruling them out.

Also, the situation can change very quickly with pg kids. One minute, they may be doing addition and the next minute they're doing algebra or calculus. Nothing is etched in stone here.

If you are considering Canada this might be helpful. http://www.ourkids.net/gifted-kids-schools.php Sydney is otherwise a lovely place (would love to live there). For the US I found this list helpful as a starting point: http://www.duketipeog.com/ It is not very easy, searching for a research position AND a good school for gifted.

At age 6, my DS has changed schools 3 times already and we are still looking at better options and expect to change schools a few more times!

We live in an area with access to very high quality enrichment opportunities and we also afterschool intensively. We don't think that we will find a school that is the perfect match for DS. Based on my experience, my advise would be to either move to Reno and enroll your child in Davidson academy or to move to an area that best suits your careers and find the best option for your child's education there. A highly gifted child like yours can easily outpace any acceleration that a school can provide. I have visited some schools that have a high reputation for catering to the highly gifted child and shadowed their classrooms and was underwhelmed by what they were teaching in the classrooms. But, a positive aspect of these "gifted" schools is that your child has a lot of peers at his LOG. Good luck.

That is pretty much how I feel.

Thank you for your candor, ashley! Finding kids of remotely similar LOG would be amazing - I just want him to connect to his peers in a meaningful way, which is few and far between right now.

I know there is most likely no perfect situation, and if we managed to find one, it probably wouldn't last. But I'm a research by nature (and occupation) and so...collecting information to make make informed decisions it just how I tick. I feel compelled to find out as much as I can - it's my way of taking some control over the situation. Luckily DH is the more laid back one, so he is usually there to reel me in when I start delving too deep, too fast, lol.

Thanks everyone for any info provided, we will definitely keep locations in mind as the post-doc search trundles on.

By the way, Hoagies has a list that shows gifted schools and specifies ones that cater to HG+ kids. It looks like California, Minnesota, Missouri, of course Nevada, North Carolina, and Washington each have schools that specify HG+.

http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/schools.htm

Finding kids of remotely similar LOG is the main reason that we are moving. Where we live gifted education and home-schooling is prohibited by law(!) and although the schools are good at making sure that no-one falls behind there is NO focus on gifted students at all- the teachers at our son´s school admit that they have no idea what to do.
Thank you so much for sharing Marnie!