Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

California's most neglected group of students: the gifted ones

latimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 553 posts

Re: California's most neglected group of students: the gifted ones

#141

Post by Animats »

csa wrote: post #10

It’s not just California, but California may be one of the more egregious state neglecters. The push at the state level for policies that focus on equality of outcomes over equality of opportunities will not end well for the gifted and talented communities. Whenever I hear these people talk about their policies, I can’t help but recall Harrison Bergeron. Focusing on equality of outcomes in a society that structurally…

> I can’t help but recall Harrison Bergeron.

That old SF story seems to come up rather often today. I read it decades ago, and never saw the 1995 made-for-TV movie.[1] For decades it was forgotten.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrison_Bergeron_(film)

Re: California's most neglected group of students: the gifted ones

#142

Post by phil21 »

laidoffamazon wrote: post #127
phil21 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it would make sense to put into place opportunities for gifted students and high achievers without regard for where they live or come from. Quite obviously. That's what's being strip-mined at the moment. I, and my peer group from "back home" would have had zero chances in life without these programs. We were not well off, and my peers did not come from families that had anything more than strong parenting - almost…

> I, and my peer group from "back home" would have had zero chances in life without these programs. We were not well off, and my peers did not come from families that had anything more than strong parenting - almost none had parents who had gone to college. They were tracked into gifted and talented programs at an early age by a school system that identified their highly capable students and resources were given to r…

> first generation Asian kids who didn’t grow up rich

If those are the kids in a specific school/school system that happen to be the most academically gifted, then they should be the ones attending the gifted and talented programs. I don't see how them attending precludes anyone else from also qualifying though? That the demographics happen to skew this way in some number of school districts is interesting at best. Rewarding strong parenting sounds like a win for society to me. Second generation immigrant children doing better than their first generation parents sounds like the American Dream working as-intended to me!

> you’d consider “moving society forward”

I likely have a much looser definition than you do, perhaps. This can simply mean being a functional member of society that participates within their community. Making the jump from poor to middle class is a huge generational achievement on it's own. If I was tossed into the "general classes" in middle school I likely would have simply been working in a factory or retail like most of my peers who stayed within that track ended up doing. The folks in the accelerated programs statistically have gone into more lucrative careers - even those who did not attend college.

It all comes down to helping those who want to help themselves, and recognizing you can't help those that don't want it. Spend the resources on the former, and give the latter the opportunity to change their ways - but don't tear down those trying to better themselves in the name of equity.

Re: California's most neglected group of students: the gifted ones

#143

Post by Spoom »

jltsiren wrote: post #92
csa wrote: post #10

It’s not just California, but California may be one of the more egregious state neglecters. The push at the state level for policies that focus on equality of outcomes over equality of opportunities will not end well for the gifted and talented communities. Whenever I hear these people talk about their policies, I can’t help but recall Harrison Bergeron. Focusing on equality of outcomes in a society that structurally…

I don't have much experience with how education works in California, or in the US in general. But there is one universal issue with special programs for gifted kids: parents. It's hard to distinguish gifted kids from average kids with ambitious parents. If you let ambitious parents push their kids to programs they are not qualified for, they can easily ruin the programs for the actual gifted kids. Gifted programs wor…

In Ontario, access to these programs was gated by an IQ test given to all students based on the outcome of a standardized test (this was ~30 years ago, no idea what they do today). I'm not saying it was perfectly objective or equitable but it was a start at trying to make it objective. Are programs not doing something similar in California or elsewhere in the US?

Re: California's most neglected group of students: the gifted ones

#144

Post by atomicUpdate »

thinkingtoilet wrote: post #20
atomicUpdate wrote: post #14

> There’s little doubt that racism played a role in identifying children as gifted even though the label was based on supposedly objective criteria. Why has the LA Times settled on racist teachers as the only reason for the skew in enrollment numbers, and why aren’t teachers upset the LA Times are calling them racists? I’m constantly surprised how often accusations like this are thrown around and how little pushback…

Honest question, you're a first grade teacher in LA. How do you "push back"? Write a tweet?

My first thought is using your union representative to amplify your voice. Presumably the union doesn't want to be associated with, or known to be representing, racists so it's in their best interests to denounce these types of statements.

Re: California's most neglected group of students: the gifted ones

#145

Post by laidoffamazon »

MarkusQ wrote: post #136
laidoffamazon wrote: post #123

I think we should stop focusing on the cognitive elite at the expense of everyone else, actually. Why should people that think folks like me are failures deserve the bulk of our attention?

Because somebody needs to keep things running for the rest of us? Seriously, we need all the bright people we can get, working on the tough problems and solving them. And we need even more basically competent people educated to keep what we have got figured out running smoothly. Life isn't some role playing game where everyone who wants to should get a turn being a surgeon or flying the jumbo jet. Competence actually…

The people that designed jumbo jets were people that went to Washington State University and UDub in the 60s. John Aaron saved Apollo 12 and 13 with a degree from Southwestern Oklahoma State. These are not people that were in “gifted programs” and they don’t fit what you perceive to be “gifted” (aka - able to get into one of 10 elite undergrad schools).

Re: California's most neglected group of students: the gifted ones

#147

Post by gowld »

BriggyDwiggs42 wrote: post #97
onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why? It costs a lot more to build a new school or maintain an existing one in The Bay than in Fresno. It also costs more for teachers since the cost of living is so much higher.

Yeah that’s fair, you might need to make the formula more complicated. The goal though would be to alter what we have now, which is extreme differences in quality between schools in rich areas and schools in poor ones, to a model where everyone can access a similarly decent quality of public schooling. Maybe the formula would need to look something like (the money required to maintain the school building) + (a wage t…

You might be surprised to learn that this is how education funding already works. Government isn't completely idiotic.

What you are ignoring is that educational spending imbalance comes from private voluntary educational spending (enrichment programs, camps, PTA), not public mandatory spending.

Re: California's most neglected group of students: the gifted ones

#148

Post by theamk »

euroderf wrote: post #140
bobfromsf wrote: post #90

As a father with a son with IQ over 160, I can tell you unequivocally that California thinks gifted kids are the enemy. Gifted children, especially profoundly gifted kids like mine are special needs. He can’t function in a regular class because he would become bored and would act out and constantly get in trouble. Since my kid was a toddler we have had to completely rely on ourselves to figure everything out and we w…

> We have had to go to private school because California does not skip grades even though it’s obvious the child doesn’t belong in the grade level for his age. Be careful what you wish for. Skipping 2nd grade led to bullying hell until I stayed for a second year of 6th. I think what you want for your kid is to skip N grades ahead in select subjects but otherwise stay in age peer group.

I suspect that won't be an issue anymore, as it is no longer possible to skip grades in public schools in many states.

And hopefully private schools would prevent "bullying hell" if they want all those tuition $$$.

Re: California's most neglected group of students: the gifted ones

#149

Post by phil21 »

laidoffamazon wrote: post #130
hintymad wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Taking resources away from those who move society forward And those people do not even have to be geniuses or top students. Our society moves forward on the back of millions of ordinary people, yet those ordinary people, me included, would benefit most from a rigorous education system.

lol, when people talk about these things they’re talking about the Lowell High kids that want to go to Yale, not normal people like me. Let’s be real here.

No, I'm talking about regular kids who grow up in hard circumstances that just need an opportunity for a better life.

This can mean a jump from working class to middle class and nothing more. That is absolutely driving society forward.

Not offering a means out of "the shit" for these kids is a way to hold them down into the circumstances they were born into and nothing more.

Zero kids I'm thinking of who went through these programs went to Yale or any other ivy. Most have great lives 20 years later, off the backs of that early opportunity for achievement.

Re: California's most neglected group of students: the gifted ones

#150

Post by laidoffamazon »

phil21 wrote: post #142
laidoffamazon wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I, and my peer group from "back home" would have had zero chances in life without these programs. We were not well off, and my peers did not come from families that had anything more than strong parenting - almost none had parents who had gone to college. They were tracked into gifted and talented programs at an early age by a school system that identified their highly capable students and resources were given to r…

> first generation Asian kids who didn’t grow up rich If those are the kids in a specific school/school system that happen to be the most academically gifted, then they should be the ones attending the gifted and talented programs. I don't see how them attending precludes anyone else from also qualifying though? That the demographics happen to skew this way in some number of school districts is interesting at best. R…

> Second generation immigrant children from first generation parents sounds like the American Dream working as-intended to me!

If your definition of the American dream is the tiny fraction of poor Asian kids that get into Stanford you have a screwed up definition of the American dream, which is built on people that go to Cal State LA and never had G&T programs.

> This can simply mean being a functional member of society that participates within their community.

People that work in factories and retail are also functional members of society and your sentence does not seem to imply that when you drew a contrast there.

Post reply on HN