<p>I’d like to know who the kids’ parents are. If it’s a community of scientists or college professors, for example, it could be possible to have an unusually high number of gifted kids.</p>
<p>I just browsed the demographics of these schools’ communities, and these are predominately white, upper-middle class suburbs of Cleveland. The academic rigor of these schools are not surprising. You will find similar stats in other major cities with wealthy and highly educated suburbs. Where I live, if you want your child in an excellent and gifted school, you live in the Bloomfield-Birmingham-Grosse Pointe areas (Detroit).</p>
<p>Um, the Wikipedia article on Rocky River has clearly been the target of student editing, some of which is just plain bad. If the 46% gifted rate is really based on Ohio Dept. of Ed. statistics, then it might have been reached by classifying a student as gifted if he/she scores at the 95%ile (or even 90th%ile) in one section of a standardized test. That picks up a large number of students with uneven talents.</p>
<p>Nonetheless, a frequency that applies to the country as a whole would, just out of sheer randomness, not apply to every locality in the country. Both 46 percent gifted (on national norms) and 0 percent gifted are reasonably likely events in some community somewhere.</p>
<p>The criteria for the “gifted” designation differ greatly from one community to another. It’s not a standardized thing. </p>
<p>If a particular area uses a generous definition of “gifted,” it might not be all that unusual to see a particular school, particularly one from an affluent area, have a “gifted” population of nearly 50 percent.</p>
<p>one thing I noticed at our district level- is that " giftedness" seems to favor those students whose parents have higher than average incomes/education & who are married.</p>
<p>One reason why I have been pushing for integration by socio-economic level, since the courts ruled placement by race is illegal.</p>
<p>I learned a long time ago that the most integrated, academic-caliber schools are the elite private schools. It might be different in other places, but some of the best private schools are more diverse than the surrounding community, which are predominately white and upper-middle class. The elite private schools have the opportunity to pool and enroll a selective, diverse group of students (who are willing to receive a scholarship or pay tuition to attend) and offer lots of academic and athletic opportunities.</p>
<p>In agreement with Marian. Our school district uses a very generous definition of “gifted” -not surprisingly, one elementary in an affluent area with low numbers of ESL students has an extremely high proportion of gifted students- another with a huge percentage of ESL students has very low numbers of identified gifted. Parents are always surprised when their “gifted” students fails to make the cut in a purely numbers based program such as CTY.</p>
<p>We also have a very high percentage of “gifted” children in our elementary school community. I can’t remember the exact numbers, but when I went to a meeting for parents of gifted children a couple of years ago, I think it was close to 50% of the children in my youngest child’s class. Apparently “above average” has come to mean “gifted” in our elementary school.</p>
<p>The student population hasn’t changed from a few years ago, when about 10% were designated gifted, but the test determining giftedness has changed.</p>
<p>An interesting note, I personally know a mom whose son did not score as “gifted” the first time he took the test used to determine this characteristic in our school. So he took it again, and this time, he was designated “gifted”. What does that say about this test?</p>
<p>ANY test, any time, has error of estimation. The take-home point for parents whose children are trying to qualify for a program is to test again if the first test doesn’t yield a qualifying score.</p>
<p>In the district I work for there is a community of parent that hold “prep” classes for the children to help them pass the gate test.
But being labeled as gifted is also the gateway to honors classes in Jr High and AP in HS. Which does not seem fair to those hard working but not “gifted” kids who would also do well in those classes.</p>
<p>In our district the gifted magnet accept kids who score 80% or above on the state administered standardized test. Very, very easy to achieve for many.
To participate in a talent search you have to score 95% or above. Not so easy any more ;)</p>
<p>Bec5656, our district actually includes what I would term high achieving students with those receiving gifted services- without them I doubt we’d have enough of a population to provide services. </p>
<p>What is interesting is there is no differentiation between levels of “giftedness” (I really hate this lingo)- so a 6th grade student who is placing out of mathematics to a 8th grade level is going to be in the same pullout activity as a 6th grader ready for calculus.</p>
<p>These stories remind me of a friend who pulled her twins (a boy and a girl) kids out of one school because their “gifted” needs weren’t being met. Then discovered she couldn’t get them both in the local private school for the gifted cause one didn’t pass the test. Oops. Well, after all, they weren’t <em>identical</em> twins!</p>
<p>The non-gifted twin was bright, just not “gifted.” I cringe when I think of the harm her ego must have suffered.</p>