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

latimes.com

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

#41

Post by kccqzy »

resource_waste wrote: post #6

What is the goal for gifted students? Skip a grade and teach them stuff ahead of time (No, their social skills cant handle it apparently) Teach them extended topics... aka waste their time on stuff they can already do. I was able to skip 1 grade in college due to my insistence on taking college classes in high school. Everyone from parents to teachers were against it. Had a random adult I met working tell me about it…

The goal should be to allow them to self-study topics ahead of time. For example, if a third grader has already demonstrated mastery of third grade material, they should be given textbooks from the fourth grade to study on their own. And if they can do fourth grade topics, go to fifth grade topics.

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

#42

Post by vundercind »

User23 wrote: post #23
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…

Because the alternative hypothesis to racist teachers is literally unspeakable.

… centuries of disadvantage compounding over generations? The predictable outcomes of poverty?

People talk about those all the time.

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

#43

Post by ironlake »

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…

> settled on racist teachers

If the population of gifted kids is statistically over-represented by white kids, then one of these must be true:

• The test doesn't measure giftedness, but rather level of education. So we would expect kids from worse schools to perform worse. This is institutional racism. The opportunity is not equal. • Gifted kids from minority communities don't have equal access to the test or the classes. This is institutional racism. The opportunity is not equal. • White kids are smarter. They all took the same test, white kids came out on top. This is a racist belief with a millennia of discredited science to back it up.

No racist teacher required.

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

#44

Post by dogprez »

nostrademons wrote: post #22
Dilettante_ wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Gifted children will get the stimulus they need at home via independent study or from their family. That's extremely optimistic.

Well-off gifted kids will get the stimulus they need at home. Poor gifted kids are out of luck. And thus, the policy serves to entrench socioeconomic disadvantage in the name of making everybody equal.

I don't believe it. Almost every kid in America has access to the internet, a public library and a teacher. How many don't have access to any of those? That's a different problem.

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

#45

Post by bluefirebrand »

bilbo0s wrote: post #11

My unpopular take is that people, and definitely the government, would take gifted options more seriously if there weren’t so many kids who did nothing more than learn the multiplication table early being classified as gifted. You limit enrollment to only the extreme outliers and at that point there would be national security benefits to identifying these children. (Heck, I'd bet the federal government might even try…

> My unpopular take is that people, and definitely the government, would take gifted options more seriously if there weren’t so many kids who did nothing more than learn the multiplication table early being classified as gifted.

It isn't that unreasonable to ask for an education system that pushes kids as fast as the kid keeps up with and eases them back if they regress to the mean at some point

Learning the multiplication table early isn't necessarily a sign that someone is a genius, but it does mean they are ahead of their class. There is no benefit to holding them back to the level of other kids their age "just in case they might not actually be gifted" or whatever it is you are proposing

If they wind up graduating high school early but then not really doing anything exceptional in their lives that's actually fine

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

#46

Post by dogprez »

marcus0x62 wrote: post #24
dogprez wrote: post #2

She makes some good points, but my take is that we in the 21st century are more bound to the success of our weakest links. Our world has become so complicated, one small mistake can have dire consequences. So, it's the state's priority to spend its limited resources helping those struggling to tread water. Gifted children will get the stimulus they need at home via independent study or from their family. I know since…

> but my take is that we in the 21st century are more bound to the success of our weakest links. Bound in what way? Gated by? Morally obligated to?

It's just the truth. Look at the boeing dreamliner failures. Hundreds of smart people doing a bang up job. It just took one a few missteps to jeopardize the whole production and peoples lives.

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

#47

Post by exe34 »

philipov wrote: post #30
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…

While I may have sympathy for your more substantive points, anytime I hear someone mention virtue signalling, it makes it sound like they're virtue signalling. Better to just not bring up that dog whistle.

it's a perfectly good phrase to describe what it says. if that bothers you, maybe you need to ask yourself why.

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

#48

Post by Jensson »

soco wrote: post #39
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…

If it was that simple I'm sure we would have seen it already. I imagine any gifted program, and you can imagine it in any way you like, will inevitably promote a majority from a certain group, thus by definition will be a target for every discrimination complaint - because basically it will be supporting and pumping more money to an already privileged group. So somebody has to decide: either targeted to constant fuss…

> Note: From the start we assume that the gifted deserve more from public school, thus we call them "neglected" when they seem to be simply treated the same.

Do you think challenged kids deserve more from public school than anyone else? The point is that different kids has different needs, the general classroom is designed for the average student and doesn't fit those who are very different regardless in what way they are different.

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

#49

Post by casey2 »

User23 wrote: post #23
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…

Because the alternative hypothesis to racist teachers is literally unspeakable.

What? That Negros are dumber than Whites? I'm sure this has been debunked multiple times, so people generally don't say it for fear of sounding stupid, not of enraging some higher up cabal of leftists that either secretly or openly control everything.

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

#50

Post by nonameiguess »

I was in California GATE programs in the 80s and 90s. I was also (and still am, I guess) Latino, so it's not like there was universal exclusion if you weren't white. As far as I remember, being placed in these programs was entirely a matter of scoring high on some IQ test you were given in 1st grade. It's hard to say the program made any difference. We took some extra classes I barely remember. We had special summer schools I actually do remember, and got some early exposure to computers before there were regular classes for them, but things I remember from these summer schools were learning how to make donuts and conducting a mock trial for Lex from Jurassic Park for getting Gennaro killed, not exactly tremendous intellecual challenges.

Frankly, I don't say this to be a dick, but teachers don't exist who can handle kids like me. I spent 16 hours a day at the public library sometimes devouring 1000-page books about how lasers worked. I got a perfect SAT score. I also won a district-wide art show three out of four years in high school. I made varsity in four sports and won two state championships. I got second place in the state spelling bee. I was on a television quiz show when I was 12. I could run a 5-minute mile when I was 12 and slam dunk a basketball by the time I was 14. I was good at everything I ever tried to do. I was smarter than the teachers and I was a rotten little immature kid who let them know it.

Some kids just aren't going to be served well by school no matter what you do, but what else was I going to be served well by? I took some college classes in high school and they weren't any more interesting. I had no interest in starting or running a business. I wasn't mature enough to hold a regular job. I can't think of anything the school system could have done that would have been better than just regular school.

Much like this writer, I ended up okay anyway.

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