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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)

#121

Post by jb12 »

cyberlurker wrote: post #97
jmyeet wrote: post #51

There are so many topics that are hard to talk about nowadays without getting into politics but politics and structural inequality are at the core of this. For the benefit of non-US readers, know that how the US funds public education (K-12) is rather unique. It's done through property taxes essentially. Depending on your state and city your property taxes can vary a lot with the same value property. But what this me…

In NYC they also flatten all Asians into one group and say the “gifted” programs aren't diverse enough because a high percentage are Asian. As if implying Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese, Korean, etc. all have the same life experience, cultures, advantages, disadvantages… Also you nailed it on the property tax point. Often overlooked as the biggest issue with education. A similar sized home in a good school district ca…

More than that, they also lump "Pacific Islanders" into the same category as "Asian", as if the Pacific Islands aren't on an entirely different continent.

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

#122

Post by mymllnthaccount »

WalterBright wrote: post #104
jmyeet wrote: post #51

There are so many topics that are hard to talk about nowadays without getting into politics but politics and structural inequality are at the core of this. For the benefit of non-US readers, know that how the US funds public education (K-12) is rather unique. It's done through property taxes essentially. Depending on your state and city your property taxes can vary a lot with the same value property. But what this me…

I've never been convinced that more money for schools produces better results. Sure, that means nicer buildings, but how does that improve education? In Washington State, the teachers finally got their "fully funding" proposal enacted, which was supposed to solve all the funding problems, including big raises for teachers. There's been zero change in results.

It's so funny to me that people treat businesses and government so differently.

Want results from your start up? Find someone to invest in it.

Want results from a government program? Well, we need to cut out all the wasteful spending.

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

#123

Post by nlittlepoole »

zmgsabst wrote: post #81
CoastalCoder wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

> I figure there's little chance of finding a compromise if I can't even comprehend their viewpoint. I understand it just fine, but there’s a fundamental disagreement, in that I don’t support racism nor view people in terms of “racial tribes” — while proponents of equity do. That’s the frame they’re working from when they say denying an Asian student a place at Harvard in favor of a less qualified black applicant is…

They aren't saying that. They are recognizing that many forms of power in society are zero sum. There are plenty of ways to get a great education but only one Harvard and a limited amount of power to be distributed via an institution like Harvard. You and many like you believe that access to these institutions should be gatekeeped via a meritocracy. The supporters of this form of affirmative action recognize that in a system where black/latino/indigenous students have structural disadvantages (poverty, prejudice, health, etc) that any pure meritocracy leads to a system where their racial group possesses disproportionately less power vs their population.

The reason you see that as "racial tribes" is that you fundamentally are underestimating how much marginalized communities distrust communities outside of their own. Black people do not trust that if Asian students go to Harvard and gain positions of power that those adults will protect their interests. They want their own in those positions.

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

#124

Post by mcculley »

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…

I was in one of these programs in middle and high school (1985-1990). My experience was that only a very small subset were selected to be tested. Most of the "gifted" students were born to parents who knew how to advocate for them and get them tested. (Mostly white, mostly upper middle class, many children of teachers.)

I am certain that if every student had been tested, the composition of the gifted classes would have been very different. Many students who fell through the cracks would have been put in the higher level classes and many at the lower end of the gifted program would not have made the cut (given fixed class sizes for the gifted program).

We should test every student.

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

#125

Post by chernevik »

UncleMeat wrote: post #69
chernevik wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is that an answer? If someone isn't meeting the qualifications they aren't in. What's "unacceptable" about that?

Because the systems which identify students and enable them to meet the admissions requirements are massively unequal. I'll give an example. I attended a gifted program starting in 3rd grade. I went to an elementary school for 1st and 2nd grade that was almost entirely white with some asian kids. Part of the mechanism for selecting students for the gifted program was a letter from the student's counselor, teacher, an…

The answer would be to improve the development of those students who are underdeveloped -- not change criteria for the identification of potential.

This is, of course, far more complicated, and involves difficult problems. Far easier to sweep it all under the rug by calling attention to qualifications "unacceptable".

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

#126

Post by abfan1127 »

jayd16 wrote: post #96
jmyeet wrote: post #51

There are so many topics that are hard to talk about nowadays without getting into politics but politics and structural inequality are at the core of this. For the benefit of non-US readers, know that how the US funds public education (K-12) is rather unique. It's done through property taxes essentially. Depending on your state and city your property taxes can vary a lot with the same value property. But what this me…

In California a large percentage is state income tax not property taxes.

In Arizona, all school funding is from the state. Then local school districts can pass school overrides via voting which then can be additional property tax in their district. Richer areas tend to have more parent involvement (both time and financially). AZ also has open enrollment which means you can enroll your child in any public school, not just your district assignment.

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

#127

Post by adverbly »

Gifted programs threads on HN are the new flame war battlegrounds... turns people into an armchair geniuses, ready to post solutions based on some anecdotal data.

I pity the actual researchers in these fields. Must be tough to work in an area that everyone has an opinion on.

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

#128

Post by oliveshell »

WalterBright wrote: post #104
jmyeet wrote: post #51

There are so many topics that are hard to talk about nowadays without getting into politics but politics and structural inequality are at the core of this. For the benefit of non-US readers, know that how the US funds public education (K-12) is rather unique. It's done through property taxes essentially. Depending on your state and city your property taxes can vary a lot with the same value property. But what this me…

I've never been convinced that more money for schools produces better results. Sure, that means nicer buildings, but how does that improve education? In Washington State, the teachers finally got their "fully funding" proposal enacted, which was supposed to solve all the funding problems, including big raises for teachers. There's been zero change in results.

How are you quantifying “results” here?

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

#130

Post by lmkg »

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…

> I had to pass essentially an IQ test to get placed into those classes. I don't see why race has anything to do with it.

Simply put, we don't know how to make objective IQ tests yet.

The questions in IQ tests tend to bake in a bunch of cultural assumptions, often in ways you don't expect. So the test measures a combination of IQ, and affinity with a specific cultural background.

First, let me be clear about this: The issue is friction. Even at the same difficulty, a question that's more accessible is less stressful and less mentally taxing. Especially when you're dealing with kids. This matters more at the cut-off than the extremes of the bell-curve, but has statistical impacts.

I just searched for "Fourth Grade IQ Test" and clicked a random link. Four of the ten questions are about sharing cookies. Baking cookies and sharing cookies are typical middle-class-white activity, but I don't know how that shakes out in other cultures. Maybe they share other foods? Maybe sharing food is offensive because it implies the other kids' parents can't provide for themselves? Maybe the kids aren't in charge of food division? The underlying math is, of course, objective. But the math is being framed through a perspective which is more or less familiar to different backgrounds.

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