One consequence of watching Les Miserables last week, is that I have been occasionally bursting out, Tourette’s-like, in snatches of song. My husband was slightly surprised, and dare I say it, a little excited, to hear, “Bargain prices up against the wall!” from “Lovely Ladies,” come flying out of my mouth today.
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This past Tuesday, our local public radio station, WGCU-FM, had as a guest, Jan Davidson, author of Genius Denied: How to Stop Wasting Our Brightest Young Minds. (Audio archive here.) One of the statistics I heard was this:
Children enrolled in Special Education classes account for approximately 15% of the student population. A little less than half that, 7%, are considered gifted and qualify for placement in accelerated programs. There is some overlap between these two groups. The balance, 78%, are in regular classes.
Here’s a radical notion: The term “gifted” is overused. Maybe the 7% aren’t really gifted, not in the true Mozart-Einstein-Michelangelo way, but are simply above average, bright, hard-working, creative students, befitting the higher expectations and stringent standards of old. Maybe the 78%, is actually a lump sum of a few average students and a majority of below average students, products of a failing educational system and lower expectations of a culture obsessed with entertainment.
I honestly do not see 7% of our students, or our population in general, coming anywhere close to being truly gifted.
And please, oh, please, do not suggest that all children are gifted in some way. Yes, everyone has their individual strengths, and weaknesses for that matter, but to say that every child is gifted in a particular discipline is akin to giving every team in the league a trophy for playing the season.
Maybe I’ll be nominated for the Golden Icepick Award.
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