School diversity group: NYC should phase out gifted programs, curb selective screening in admission

[conuly]

Gifted screening in pre-k is fucked up to begin with, but I can 100% promise you that nobody will take this advice well.

Bring on the popcorn!

Comments

[thawrecka]

Popcorn time is right! Gifted programs for small kids were a bad idea to begin with, but I suspect a lot of people are really attached to that bad idea.

[peoriapeoriawhereart]

I think it's more the non-gifted classroom is bad for small kids. They need recess, all of them, and they need moar of all the good things school can be.

[conuly]

The gifted kids are no more likely to get recess, and honestly, a lot of those classes are STILL badly run.

[peoriapeoriawhereart]

Yeah, the only way the pull outs were good is it gave some respite from stir, but that was later into school than pre-k.

[conuly]

NYC doesn't do pull-outs either. Only full-day classes.

[peoriapeoriawhereart]

I suspect that's because student density is higher.

In fifth grade we discussed books the other kids didn't read, meeting in the mothballed industrial arts room.

[melannen]

The gifted classes I was in at that early age were mainly a benefit because the teacher/student ratio was much, much less, and thus I actually felt listened to and seen. The actual content of the classes, nothing special.

And I suspect the non-gifted kids could have used that extra attention at least as much.

[altamira16]

My sister was telling me about this earlier, and I told her that the more I learn about gifted education, the more conflicted I feel about it. Where I live, they test everyone in the second grade. We had my son tested in the first because he was making trouble because needs were going unserved.

He is now in the third, the first year with an actual gifted pull out that happens twice a week. I think he enjoys it.

My conflicted feelings are due to the fact that I have been reading up on this topic, and "What the hell is giftedness? How are kids getting identified?"

[orcofnewyork]

I'm expecting full blown meltdowns from both parents and teachers. Between this and our tightening of vaccination exemptions I do not envy my friends in the NY school districts this year. (In case that was unclear, I'm very pro-vaccine and glad we are only allowing documented medical exemptions).

I personally take a pretty dim view of gifted classes for a number of reasons. I personally hope they phase them out entirely. Smaller class sizes with better equipped teachers and schools can do a lot more good than the exclusion, elitism, and pressure that gifted classes as they stand bring.

[silveradept]

That looks to be a fascinating debate. It definitely seems like good reforms that would make all classrooms like gifted ones is ideal, but putting resources back into schools instead of relying on (likely-biased) tests to pull out the people you're implicitly saying are going to succeed is a good way to start.