Dive Brief:

• Federal law mandates that educational progress for poor, minority, and ELL students be tracked, but no guidelines are in place for tracking the progress of gifted students. 
• Chester Finn, author of “Failing Our Brightest Kids,” tells U.S. News that the nation rewards teachers for getting students to proficient levels, but does little to support gifted kids — especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds.
• Part of the problem is a lack of consensus around what, exactly, qualifies as a program for gifted students.

Dive Insight:

Although the federal Jacob K. Javits Gifted and Talented Children and Youth Education Act of 1988 acknowledged a need for gifted learning programs, there is no federal definition of "giftedness" for states or local education agencies. There's also no existing requirements guiding how gifted programs are executed. U.S. News reports that 35 states do track identify and track their best-performing students, but the remaining 15 don’t track those students at all.

According to the National Association for Gifted Children, between 6-10% of students are gifted and could use additional support in the classroom. Minority students havelong been underrepresented in the gifted category, which the NAGC calls “especially troublesome.” The organization reports that low-income students are also dramatically underrepresented.

In 2014, an in-depth University of Virginia study on gifted programs in the United States sponsored in part by the U.S. Department of Education looked at 2,000 elementary school districts, 1,753 middle school districts, and 1,160 high school districts, finding similarly dismal results regarding minority and low-income student representation within the reported gifted student population. 

Recommended Reading

U.S. News & World Report: Gifted Yet Disadvantaged Kids May Be Getting Short Shrift