In the wake of a reshuffling of public schools’ gifted and talented programs, some parents and education representatives worry that the change will result in a less diverse selection of students.
Two years ago, gifted and talented entrance exams for public elementary school students were standardized across New York City, with the intent of bringing certain underperforming districts up to par. Last spring, the school system centralized the location where students took the test. Yet many parents and educators feared that competition across districts with large socio-economic gaps would lead to a kind of reverse affirmative action and that students from disadvantaged backgrounds would be ousted by those from traditionally educated, wealthier families.
Originally, students in kindergarten and first grade took entrance exams specific to their district and would compete for spots with students of similar educational resources. The highest-scoring students were then guaranteed seats within that district.
But this plan bred large discrepancies. Students in higher-achieving districts faced much tougher competition to get into the program, while ones from lower-achieving districts could get in more easily. Administrators soon realized that many of the students who qualified within their own districts weren’t cutting it within the context of the larger system, forcing classes to move more slowly and defeating the program’s initial purpose.
A parent coordinator from a District 3 school, who asked for anonymity because she did not want to get in trouble with her employer, expressed concern that “the personal part of the process” was now gone, and that “ethnically, you’ll definitely see a change in every school.”
Though the New York City Department of Education initially believed that the new testing could cut nearly half of the programs’ current participants, DoE press official Andy Jacob said that the numbers did not bear out that prediction. “We’re actually seeing a huge increase in the number of students who are qualifying city-wide, and hopefully we’ll see the trend continue,” he said.
According to the DoE, the districts with the greatest increases in the number of qualifying students were often the poorest. The Department also stated that it would be willing to fund the opening of more seats and more classes in the areas where the number of qualifying candidates now outnumbered the seats available.
The parent coordinator from district 3 said it was too early to speak about the change in her own school, though she did comment that the new gifted and talented class had many more girls than boys. She noted that the standardized testing raised questions about whether tests can accommodate gender-based learning differences.
To recruit students from underrepresented districts, the DoE has also initiated an awareness campaign to inform parents of the gifted and talented programs in their areas. Several years ago, the $150 application fee was removed.
Rita Yoskowitz, parent coordinator of P.S. 9, said that while “there will always be the lost souls who don’t know where to go and ask, information about gifted and talented programs is available everywhere.”
Gwendolyn Rowell, a parent coordinator of P.S. 129, is unfazed by all the transitions. “I’ve been working in Harlem schools for 50 years, and education is always changing” she said. “Kids come here from all walks of life— you’ll see Hondurans, Asians, African Americans. I don’t think much is going to change.”
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