Corinne’s Blog

Gifted education has always been a particular point of interest to me since I went to Stargate Charter School, which is a school designed for students with an IQ of 130 or higher. Not that I am a genius or a prodigy, but I do supposedly, (my parents have never actually told me what my IQ is), have an above average IQ. I never went to a regular public school until I started high school, so I never experienced what some brighter kids may have experienced as far as being trapped in a boring education. I am grateful for that, because I do believe that if I had attended a regular public school that didn’t challenge me enough I would have grown to resent school and my peers.

It is my belief that educating extremely intelligent kids should be taken as seriously as the “special” education of below average students and handicapped students. The intelligently above average children should be able to skip grades in regular public schools, if that is what works best for their family and living situations. Skipping grades is, as the article in Time Magazine stated, virtually cost-free; and, more importantly, it allows these intelligent individuals to receive the education they deserve while staying in a social environment. However, this situation might become slightly precarious when a student needs to jump three or more grades to be adequately challenged. Students need to be educated in a way that is academically, socially, and emotionally appropriate for them. Some students might be emotionally and socially developed enough to skip grades in their neighborhood school. But the answer for others might be a special school like the Davidson Academy that allows for students to stay with students closer to their own age so that they can emotionally and socially mature while still receiving a good education.

In my opinion, what it comes down to is the resources provided for the intelligently gifted students needs to be equal to those made available for the “special” needs students; because those brilliant children still have special needs: they just aren’t the type of special needs that most Americans are used to thinking about. These extremely bright students need to be nurtured so that they have all the opportunities possible to flourish.