Top 20+ Questions to Ask Local Districts Related to G/T Education

By Roberta Braverman, NJAGC Advocacy Vice President, advocacy@njagc .org

From the many questions we receive via phone and email and from meeting parents at our conference, this piece was crafted to help provide direction for local advocates. Please make the commitment to find the answers and share them with NJAGC.

Make an appointment with leadership in your district in the spring to effect changes for fall. If your town has a G/T parent support group to help or if you know of other parents with similar concerns, go together.

In order to be recognized as a contributor to your local district, offer to write an article for the school board or district publication or for posting on the web site that will honor your district’s G/T Best Practices. Offer your participation on a local committee designed to evaluate or improve your gifted practices and services.

NJAGC would like you to write the answers to these questions and send them to us so that we can develop a contact list and have answers to inquiries about local districts or services throughout the state for gifted education.

• Who is the contact person in our district / building who handles gifted issues? What is his/her title and job responsibility related to gifted education? Do we have a coordinator of gifted?
• Do we have highly qualified G/T specialists in gifted education in our school or district? How many gifted specialists do we have employed compared with total staff? How many gifted specialists do we have employed compared with special education staff? What are the ratios of staff to students (G/T, regular education and special education)?
• How are educational decisions made to assure instruction at an appropriate challenge level for my child? [include evidence of process, timeline, chain of command, forms and authorization and documentation needed]
• How do we assure annual yearly progress for my child?
• Is my child evaluated with out of level tests if grade level concepts have already been mastered to insure instruction at a challenge level?
• What is the process to determine if modifications are needed for my child’s curriculum, instruction, and placement? How do we assure that modifications are being implemented?
• May I please have a copy of the policies and procedures for identifying and accommodating gifted students and the continuum of services provided by this district for gifted students? How does our community know of these timelines? Where are they published or distributed? [See Frameworks to support the NJ Core Curriculum Content Standards distributed by the NJ Department of Education.]
• Do all principals, curriculum specialists and policy makers for our district know of the NJ Administrative Code requiring identification of and educational services for gifted students, and what practices are in place to assure compliance? Do we serve students in all grades? How many students are identified as gifted and served in each grade level compared to the total population?
• How many courses or hours of training has my child’s regular classroom teacher had in curriculum compacting and differentiating instruction to meet the academic needs of gifted students? Do our honors or advanced placement teachers have training in gifted education?
• What training has our school guidance counselor had in the social emotional needs of gifted students?
• Does our school / district group or cluster gifted children together? If not, why?
• Are there acceleration policies and practices available by subject and/or grade level? Has our administration read the Templeton report on acceleration published in A Nation Deceived?
• Does our district provide annual professional development for all staff about gifted education?
• Are accommodations or modifications for gifted students noted in lesson plans?
• Is our gifted program the only academic modification in our district? How do we modify the delivery of core curriculum content to our highly able students?
• What is the evaluation procedure of the identification process and services our district provides for gifted students? Are our G/T leaders aware of the National Standards for Gifted Programs? Pre K-Grade 12 Standards How does our district measure up in all areas?
• Does our district have a current membership in/subscription to publications of the New Jersey and National Associations for Gifted Children? [see http://www.njagc.org/ and http://www.nagc.org/ ]
• Do our administrators, specialists and classroom teachers attend the NJAGC annual conference or other training opportunities for gifted education? Do we publicize the event to families? Do our students compete in the contests offered by NJAGC?
• What is reflected in our school budget, programs and publications to support gifted education (for staff, parents, and students) such as student materials, professional library, professional development, guest speakers, field trips, web site, technology and equipment?
• How can we improve in the areas we’ve discussed so that our district serves its gifted children better? What is the timeline to review and revise our services to gifted students? Who will be responsible? How will results be reported?