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New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

nytimes.com

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Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#191

Post by dorchadas »

lowercased wrote: post #39
rvba wrote: post #9

I dont think that one can judge if a kod is gifted or not at the age of 4, but stupid people dragging smart people down with "equality" is a big problem with current system. I was a part of a gifted program and I dont understand why there arent more of them.

I think you can , in some (many?) cases. Whether you should or not (or... how you do it) is perhaps the deeper question. My parents were pushed by others around them to get me recognized as gifted/advanced (or whatever the term in the 70s was). Other parents (and my parents' parents) all recognized something different, so my parents went to the school, right before I started kindergarten. They got a reassuring pat on…

I'm glad your school did that. My mom had to fight against my elementary school because they wanted to keep me back a year in kindergarten because I wasn't mature enough. Likely, I was just bored. I went in to school reading and could do basic arithmetic already (even knew some basic multiplication), but they wanted to keep me back. Also happened going into middle school when I tested out of prealgebra (the accelerated math class they offered) but the new principal wanted to keep everyone the same. Thankfully I had good elementary school teachers through 3rd grade who recognized this and gave me challenging stuff instead (never made me read what the other kids read, harder msthh practice sheets, etc).

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#192

Post by padastra »

InitialLastName wrote: post #172
padastra wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are numerous sources in this thread that show that the Asian group, highly selected for here, are predominantly poor. Just parroting a talking point without looking at the data is as idiotic as what we all accuse Trump supporters of.

To counter evidence with evidence, the "Asian" group is very heterogeneous, and more bimodal with respect to wealth than other groups[0][1]. Has anyone presented any data that I missed on which side of that divide the Asian G&T students in NYC schools are being drawn from? [0] https://ncrc.org/racial-wealth-snapshot-asian-americans-and-... [1] https://documentedny.com/2018/09/04/language-gap-drives-grow...

I'm not sure that's counter evidence (i.e. it doesn't lend proof to the OP's position either, it just decreases the certainty of both positions).

The only source I could find with respect to your question is that "Students from the 19 poorest districts, who make up about 31% of kindergarteners citywide, represented about 28% of gifted offers last year" (https://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/education/ny-gifted-adm...), but I do not have the primary data.

Given the overall ethnic representation of the school, it is statistically extremely likely that a large fraction of the 28% are Asian.

I also find no cited evidence in many of the pro-ending-G&T articles that G&T programs cater to wealthy students, and presumably De Blasio and others who have access to the data and want to end the programs would have pushed those facts out there.

Anecdotally, wealthy whites and asians have the opportunity to send their children to private schools without spending a large portion of their young lives testing into G&T programs.

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#193

Post by threatofrain »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #133
tomp wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's possible that the average school provides insufficient challenge & motivation for the average student, so that rising expectations results in a rise of performance. It's also likely that an "advanced" programme was less tolerant to disruptions and required students to focus more. But regardless, that doesn't change the fact that there are difference between people, and they're shown very early in development. It…

No program was provided. The kids were just labelled. The label was a placebo, and it worked. Straw-man examples of differences in kids are cute but not helpful. The issue was the imbalance in NYC advanced programs was clearly racial, which begs some kind of correction. Or do we have to resort to "Black kids aren't ever smart enough?" Is that your argument?

Why would structural racism in NYC's gifted and talented program exclude blacks while including Asians as the largest plurality, despite that they are among the poorest demographics in NYC? What is the explanation for this kind of effect size?

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#194

Post by disambiguation »

kind of tangential.. but i'm constantly baffled by how antiquated our K-12 education system is.

8am - 2pm, a few dozen kids in 1 class room, 1 teacher, 1 white board, shuffled from one class to the next, school bells, homework, midterms, final exam.

compare this side by side with schooling 200 years ago, and not much has changed.

i can't understand why education hasn't been open sourced and unified.. an why there isn't even a concerted effort to do so?

why are 1000s of teachers nation-wide working in silos and reinventing algebra lesson plans every year?

why are kids arbitrarily locked in to schedules that don't consider their individual needs and level?

resourcing is definitely a problem, and poor teacher salaries are criminal, but the whole thing is designed poorly.

further the institution has doubled down on this method .. more testing, more metrics, more pedigrees. This incentivizes gaming the system.

to come full circle, these G&T programs are a symptom of the core problems leading parents to desperate fight for alternative teaching because they have correctly assessed the public programs are not sufficient if you really want a shot at academic success.

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#195

Post by gorwell »

throwaway6734 wrote: post #25
0xB31B1B wrote: post #18

I am generally quite liberal but I strongly disagree with he current strain of progressive education reform. There are inherent differences within the capabilities of students, we can detect these early, and we should use them to provide students with appropriate challenges. Our education system should provide avenues for top students to excel, ad hopefully these top students become the people who create businesses o…

The current progressive movement is highly illiberal

The twitter mob doesn't like to hear that but it's absolutely true. It's illiberal, intolerant and regressive. Actual progressives and liberals see this clear as day. Most of us are just too afraid of the mob to say it.

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#196

Post by civilized »

refenestrator wrote: post #151
seoaeu wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HN regularly has threads full of complaints about how whiteboard interviews don't test the right things and unfairly harm a subset of people that doesn't correlate well to programming ability. It doesn't seem that implausible that the test the district is using has similar flaws in selecting gifted students

Sure, but the motivation here is explicit, and it's not about making the test more accurate.

To be fair, there are a variety of factions and motivations, and not everyone is race-baiting like Carranza. It's disturbing is that Carranza types are defended and given power within our cities, but there are also real issues with tests like the SHSAT, which are not as well-validated as other scholastic aptitude tests.

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#197

Post by moron4hire »

darthvoldemort wrote: post #119

The inconvenient truth about NYC G&T program is that it is 40% Asian. Asians have dominated the G&T program, even "stealing" spots from white kids where 43% of NYC is white, but only 35% of spots taken by white kids. And Asians are dominating the NYC G&T program NOT because of hundreds of years of systemic racism, NOT because Asians wrote the admissions tests an inbueing cultural bias, and NOT by cheating or bribing…

I don't know what you're reading, but Thomas Jefferson High School is not in Fairfax. It's here in Alexandria. Fairfax would be half an hour drive for me and I live on the extreme, western edge of Alexandria. There's a whole, other city in between (Annandale). It'd be like saying something was in Brooklyn when it's actually in Queens.

Virginia is a weird state. Fairfax and Alexandria are classified as "independent cities", which exist in parallel to and outside of counties. There are only 41 independent cities in the US: Baltimore, MD; St. Louis, MO; Carson City, NV, and then 38 more in Virginia.

The signficance is that independent cities can't levy income tax, but have to pay for their own schools and roads. We make revenue through property taxes (not just land/houses, but also cars! That's a whole other story) and business licenses. The state then calculates how much it will contribute to our school funding based on our supposed "ability to pay".

Between property values and transit issues here, there are a likely more "property owners" in Fairfax than here in Alexandria. Alexandria is much more of a bedroom community for DC, whereas people in Fairfax spread more across NoVA for work. The state sees the higher property values in Alexandria, and our higher population, and thinks "oh, they are loaded, they don't need so much". But we're not. We're a town of renters. All the property is owned by DC and NYC property developers, which got sweetheart tax break incentives to build here.

You can readily see it when visiting. Fairfax's roads are nicer. Their public buildings are newer and larger. They have several, gorgeous, gigantic public parks with stuff like kiddie train rides around the perimeter. Fairfax is apparently rolling in cash. And Alexandria can't even fix a foot bridge across a 20-foot wide creek bed.

So we just don't have the money to fund our schools anymore. Hell, my own kid's school is one of the better ones in town and they can't even afford to have enough bus drivers and substitute teachers for the year. It's garden variety bad administration over the last 15 years, not anti-Asian sentiment.

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#198

Post by Zababa »

bitwize wrote: post #188
Zababa wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for the clear and honest answer, that's what I was looking for. > Even without Jim Crow laws and segregation, even assuming everyone is perfectly colorblind, the historical context where there were slavery and Jim Crow laws for hundreds of years means that whites wield considerably greater social capital than blacks, and that means they have a significant social advantage. How do you reconcile this view wit…

> How do you reconcile this view with the fact that asians were also discriminated against, but now do better than whites? There are places where blacks do better than whites. In the Bronx, New York, the standard of living went up because of an influx of Afro-Caribbean immigrants who made more than the local white population. But minorities with an earned advantage are outside consideration of equity policy, which is…

Thanks again for all the explanation and the civil conversation. I guess the only things that stays a mystery for me is why the focus on race, especially when you said that they focus on poor people inside that group?

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#199

Post by ziml77 »

bitwize wrote: post #167
Zababa wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll preface this by saying that I don't live in the USA, so some of these things are a bit alien to me. I'm sorry if the way I word things here is not the best, the goal here is not to attack or even label something as good or bad, but only understanding. > This movement has moved away from labeling racist a policy that was implemented with racist intent (like segregated schools during Jim Crow) towards labeling rac…

The thing about racism is, a system can be racist without being explicitly so. Even without Jim Crow laws and segregation, even assuming everyone is perfectly colorblind, the historical context where there were slavery and Jim Crow laws for hundreds of years means that whites wield considerably greater social capital than blacks, and that means they have a significant social advantage. The amelioration for this is eq…

I'm not sure that holding people back in an attempt to boost up others will amount to anything good. If you hold white people back to give black people a chances, the white people are going to hate black people that much more. It's certain to lead to worse issues with racism.

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#200

Post by darthvoldemort »

moron4hire wrote: post #197
darthvoldemort wrote: post #119

The inconvenient truth about NYC G&T program is that it is 40% Asian. Asians have dominated the G&T program, even "stealing" spots from white kids where 43% of NYC is white, but only 35% of spots taken by white kids. And Asians are dominating the NYC G&T program NOT because of hundreds of years of systemic racism, NOT because Asians wrote the admissions tests an inbueing cultural bias, and NOT by cheating or bribing…

I don't know what you're reading, but Thomas Jefferson High School is not in Fairfax. It's here in Alexandria. Fairfax would be half an hour drive for me and I live on the extreme, western edge of Alexandria. There's a whole, other city in between (Annandale). It'd be like saying something was in Brooklyn when it's actually in Queens. Virginia is a weird state. Fairfax and Alexandria are classified as "independent ci…

My friend lives in Fairfax and her school district feeds into TJ, so I assumed it was in Fairfax. This is a front-and-center issue for her.
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