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The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

teachforamerica.org

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Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#41

Post by dottedmag »

This reminds me of a short story from Soviet times:

Russia, 1917. A commotion on the street. A lady asks a servant to find out what's going on. The servant returns:

- Revolution!

- That's fabulous. My grandfather was a revolutionary too. What do they wish to achieve?

- They want to make sure nobody is rich!

- That's odd... My grandfather wanted to make sure nobody is poor.

P.S: A sad irony is that Soviet education system was pretty good at maintaining gifted programs.

(edit: formatting)

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#42

Post by wccrawford »

paulpauper wrote: post #16
Bostonian wrote: post #5

"The current population of students we identify as academically gifted and talented is unacceptably whiter and wealthier than the actual student population of academically gifted and talented students should be." A typical IQ threshold for a gifted program is 130. The average IQ overall is 100 with standard deviation 15. For black Americans the average score on IQ tests is about 85, which explains why blacks will be…

I depends. I think the threshold is more like 120, but IQ may not be used anymore as a criteria

It's probably not used as the criteria for a few reasons, but I'd bet it still correlates pretty strongly in the end.

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#43

Post by [deleted] »

jeremyjh wrote: post #18
derac wrote: post #11

Gifted programs are "unacceptably white". WTF does that mean? I had to pass essentially an IQ test to get placed into those classes. For me, it made a big difference in being engaged in schoolwork when every class consisted of reiterating content for days which I had mastered in minutes. Edit: I removed "I don't see what race has to do with it." I do see how race can affect this when the gatekeeper is a teacher with…

Just read what he wrote? > Black students are 66% less likely to be identified as gifted compared to white students with similar test scores. Black, Latinx, and Native American students are far less likely to attend a school that even offers a gifted program.

[deleted]

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#44

Post by basedgod »

natly wrote: post #12
basedgod wrote: post #7

Quoted post unavailable.

There's usually gifted programs in poor schools as well. This isn't a private vs public education thing. It's more about keeping bright students stimulated and not bored to tears and have their potential stunted.

you're right, there's absolutely no systemic bias in testing, and the tests themselves accurately measure intelligence and giftedness

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#45

Post by mistrial9 »

derac wrote: post #11

Gifted programs are "unacceptably white". WTF does that mean? I had to pass essentially an IQ test to get placed into those classes. For me, it made a big difference in being engaged in schoolwork when every class consisted of reiterating content for days which I had mastered in minutes. Edit: I removed "I don't see what race has to do with it." I do see how race can affect this when the gatekeeper is a teacher with…

> every class consisted of reiterating content for days which I had mastered in minutes

literally the same experience for me; many people in urban school never became literate in their entire adult lives, let alone math.

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#47

Post by CoastalCoder »

zmgsabst wrote: post #6

Eliminating “gifted” programs because they offend the racial sensibilities of the managerial class is a blatant exercise in privilege and ladder-pulling. I think it’s grotesque how many privileged people are happily destroying the lives of others (often, those they pretend to care about) so they don’t have to think critically about or be uncomfortable thinking about race. Seattle is the epitome of “privileged White l…

I'm pretty socially conservative, and the equality-of-outcome mindset is very unintuitive for me.

It's very tempting (edit: for me) to lazily rest on the caricature, "I don't care how many people I hurt, as long as I can help just one!"

Despite that, or maybe because of that, I make a conscious effort to understand where the other side is coming from. I figure there's little chance of finding a compromise if I can't even comprehend their viewpoint.

So far I haven't been very successful. Maybe it's because the chasm is so large regarding values, understandings of human nature, predictions about how things will play out, etc. Or maybe I have blind spots that get in the way.

I wish I were better at this. It seems like at a very zoomed-out level we want similar things.

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#48

Post by robonerd »

The gifted program helped me immensely in highschool, although the hour or two I actually spent in the gifted classroom was mostly wasted playing board games. However being in that program gave me the ability to switch classes/teachers whenever one wasn't working for me, usually because some teachers could maintain a civil classroom and other teachers let the students run wild and taught nothing. Because I was in the gifted program, the school permitted me to switch out of those classrooms into classes taught by competent/caring teachers.

This suggests to me that the advantage of the program could be conferred to students who score low on IQ tests but are nevertheless behaved in class. A better gifted program would be one that differentiates on the basis of civility, not IQ. Of course, deferring measurement of IQ to some licensed professionals is easier than objectively quantifying a student's civility, so I don't know how this would actually be implemented.

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#49

Post by jaywalk »

whatshisface wrote: post #3

> I agree that it is unacceptable to have eighth grade Algebra I classes and gifted education programs that disproportionately exclude Black and brown children. But if equity is the goal, we should be mandating that every eighth grader takes Algebra I—and then structure the entire pre-K to seventh grade student experience to ensure this is a legitimate possibility for every child. Since when does equity mean everyone…

So what happens when we decide "everyone is gifted" and teach all students at the level that would have been taught only to gifted students before? Seems like the obvious outcome would be a lot more students who struggle, necessitating a slower track for them. So instead of regular and gifted classes, you have regular and "non-gifted" (for lack of a better term) classes.

This is why equity is a bullshit goal.

Re: The case for expanding rather than eliminating gifted education programs (2021)

#50

Post by chitowneats »

paulpauper wrote: post #28

The kids of elites and the rich will always have opportunities regardless of aptitude. Is it any surprise actor's kids tend to also have many opportunities in acting. Opposing gifted education, acceleration, etc. seems like another way of pulling up the ladder, even if it's framed as being well-intentioned.

Exactly. The people hurt most by this are lower income Americans, many of them immigrants, for whom these programs are a golden ticket out of poverty. Absolutely shameful what they are destroying here.
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