Polaris at Ebert second-graders
Guinness Vanos, left foreground,
and Jlynn Terroade, both 8 years
old, join other students in learning
dance techniques during a
physical-education class.
(Craig F. Walker, The Denver Post)
Posted on 03/09/2008 5:11:37 AM PDT by yankeedame
By Jeremy P. Meyer
The Denver Post
Article Last Updated: 03/04/2008 06:34:50 AM MST
Polaris at Ebert second-graders
Guinness Vanos, left foreground,
and Jlynn Terroade, both 8 years
old, join other students in learning
dance techniques during a
physical-education class.
(Craig F. Walker, The Denver Post)
More minority and poor students in Denver are being classified as highly gifted under a new system that gives extra credit to children who are economically disadvantaged or nonnative English speakers.
Denver Public Schools is trying to fix a disparity in the program that serves its smartest and most talented students — which up until now has drawn mostly white students in a district that is mostly Latino.
"It's a much more holistic look at the kid," said Diana Howard, principal at Polaris at Ebert... "
==snip==
...Denver is the only district in the metro area that has a program specifically for "highly gifted and talented students."
To determine who gets into the program, the district previously relied on oral tests that measure a student's reasoning and IQ.
But some educators and social scientists believe those tests are biased against students learning English and poorer students who may not have had the same life experiences as their richer peers....
...To make things more equitable, the district now relies on a sum of measures to determine eligibility into the highly gifted program — cognitive tests, annual assessments, reading tests and teacher nominations. Next year, the district will consider artwork and writings.
Also, students get extra points toward entry into the program if English is their second language or if they receive federal meal benefits — a measure of poverty...
==snip==
Experts in the gifted field say DPS's change follows a national trend.
"Standardized tests are tipped against children from underserved populations and children from diverse backgrounds," said Nancy Green, executive director of the National Association for Gifted Children. "We have got to find other ways besides verbal tests to determine whether kids are gifted."
The American Civil Liberties Union in California last year threatened to sue...over low numbers of Latinos and African-Americans in the [Tustin Unified School]district's gifted programs.
Districts from Miami to New York are giving more credit to smart children from culturally diverse or economically disadvantaged backgrounds...
==snip==
...DPS's student population is 57 percent Latino, 20 percent white and 19 percent black. But the highly gifted and talented program serves only 25 percent ethnic minorities,....
....One other reason for the more diverse field is that more students are applying to be in the program. This year, the district began mailing home applications to likely candidates with self-addressed stamped envelopes to be returned to the district office.
With that change, the district received about 500 more applicants for the program. Almost 170 more students were accepted for the 2008-09 school year than this year — including 49 English-language learners and 119 students who receive free and reduced lunches. Those were threefold increases in both categories over the previous year.
"This is exciting," said Howard, who started the district's only elementary school for highly gifted and talented students in 2000 in the old Crofton school in Five Points....
==snip==
Inside the brick building, off Park Avenue West, creative chaos takes place, Howard said.
"We're very messy," she said, pointing to a cardboard box overflowing with forgotten coats.
Artwork adorns the walls, African drumbeats waft from dance class, and fourth-graders in the library study for their trip to Crow Canyon Archaeological Center, near Mesa Verde National Park....
Kindergartners entering Polaris are reading "Harry Potter" while peers elsewhere are learning their ABCs.
"They are very different children — difficult to raise," Howard said. "They are very intense. This is a safe place for kids to be, and ask their weird questions and make up their strange games."
Soon, she hopes, kids from all backgrounds will have the same opportunity to be safe and weird in their brilliance.
Jeremy P. Meyer: 303-954-1367 or jpmeyer@denverpost.com
“Basically, we are labeling ungifted kids as “gifted”. It’s a good way to dumb down the system. I don’t care if a kid is dumb as a sack of rock cocaine, if they can dance, they are gifted. They may be reading Harry Potter as kindergarteners this year but next year, we’ll be happy if they can breathe through their nose”.
That will not help the child, pushing a child who cannot speak English, into the more difficult classes. They need remedial help, not PUSHING into harder classes.
Yep - lower expectations and equalize the opportunities to the least common.
Well then! There's only one solution. Make the harder classes easier. A field trip to an escalator seems in order. (Hey, whatever it takes to get that extra per child funding!)
And they wonder why so many people turn to private school and home school.
That is what they will do, you are right.
Just another tax-payer-funded experiment in social engineering brought to you by the Leftists in the NEA. If you have a gifted child, send him to private school or home school him. The Leftists in charge of the government schools will do everything they can to bring him down to the level of those they deem more deserving. He has had too many advantage, you know.
I suspect strongly that the "harder" component will disappear in favor of "creativity". In short, dumbed down.
Ever wonder what happened to some of the moonbats from San Fran? Another great state has been Californicated.
When I saw the headline and the little blurb on the top of the page, I was going to write about how this shows the socialist system is stifling talent and potential of the poor that are on the public dole. Going to rant about the conversation I just had with my daughter, how we are creating slaves with this system; then I read more of the story. Ughhh they want to take a more holistic approach, IQ tests are racist and class prejudiced, another quota (oops, I mean affirmative action) system designed to discriminate against the actual gifted student.
“Artwork adorns the walls, African drumbeats waft from dance class, and fourth-graders in the library study for their trip to Crow Canyon Archaeological Center, near Mesa Verde National Park....”
But are the gifted children learning math?
Only fuzzy math, and dude, it be fuzzy.
This is nothing new, and is why I pulled my oldest daughter out of the local "gifted" program to homeschool her 10 years ago. She started college at 15 and is an engineering major now
Check out the article on “Math 55 at Harvard”. Since science is the only thing at Harvard having any intellectual content, the libs are dead set on making sure that it’s dumbed down like their lib arts and law school. (Yup, law school is still hard, but look at what’s coming out.) Be afraid, be very afraid...especially when one of these “quota” scientists starts designing your next airplane.
Denver Public Schools is trying to fix a "disparity" (factual statistics) in the program that serves its smartest and most talented students — which up until now has drawn mostly white students in a district that is mostly Latino.
So NOW they have to dream up excuses to get the anchor babies out of the IQ gutter? Ok, >>>WHY<<< are the anchor babies IN the IQ gutter?
I bet Denver Public Schools would have seizures before they would address such a simple and straightforward question. And of course I am an evil far right-wing radical “extremist” for even asking such a blatant racist question.
Round and round the toilet bowl they go…
I disagree with you. There are undoubtedly very gifted children who don’t have the world experiences or speak english as their primary language. I’m not for calling ungifted children, gifted, but I am in support of measurements that consider more than one test.
Please get your kids away from the public school system...they're making your kid stupid and teaching him/her that it's admirable to be that way.
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