Rethinking how we identify ‘gifted’ students 

With renewed attention to equity and students’ individual needs, gifted education can serve as one pathway through which students of all backgrounds can have their needs met. 

Public education has long been viewed as society’s great equalizer, an institution that can change life trajectories, enabling students from even the humblest of backgrounds to master content and skills that will allow them to thrive when they reach adulthood. With great ambition, however, comes great responsibility: If our schools offer the surest route from poverty to the middle class, then they have an obligation to help as many students as possible to reach an acceptable standard of performance, one that will permit them to succeed in college and/or the workplace.  

This idea permeates the contemporary discourse about education, where terms like proficient and grade-level evoke a minimum standard — on the way to college and career readiness — that all students are expected to reach. If they clear that bar, whether by an inch or a mile, then their school has done its job; if too many of them fall short, then the school has failed. In short, our public schools are under a great deal of pressure to identify and support struggling students, helping them to meet the standard.  

But a true embrace of equity means that all students get the support they need. What, then, do our schools do for those students who need to be challenged at much higher levels than where the bar has been set? 

Who is gifted? 

Traditionally, schools have served some portion of those students by enrolling them in gifted and talented (GT) programs. In recent years, though, the field has evolved in important ways, in part to address long-standing concerns. As critics have often noted, when children are designated as gifted, this seems to imply that they are qualitatively different from everybody else, as though they’ve been singled out for a lifetime membership in an exclusive club. In truth, high achievement is much more fluid than that: Children will often race ahead in one area while struggling in others, or they’ll make rapid progress for a while and then slow down, or they’ll struggle for a while and then begin to make rapid progress. Thus, in an effort to highlight students’ current level of achievement in specific areas, rather than to suggest that they belong permanently to a gifted elite, many GT programs have come to use labels such as advanced academics or classes for highly capable students. Still, though, while the labels may be different, the goal tends to be similar: Such programs are meant to support those students found to need more of a challenge. 

Gifted and talented education has also expanded to include a focus on talent development. Whereas traditional GT programs focused on challenging students who were already advanced in one or more areas, many of these programs now include services meant to develop the potential of students who have yet to demonstrate high achievement, often because they’ve had fewer opportunities to do so. No longer is the focus solely on the needs of already advanced learners; increasingly, the goal also includes developing the potential of all students.  

Providing equitable and personalized learning experiences to all students may seem unobjectionable. However, two challenges have plagued GT education since its inception and made it difficult to achieve this goal. First, gifted programs have been dominated by students from white, Asian American, and upper-income backgrounds (Grissom, Redding, & Bleiberg, 2019; Peters et al., 2019), and this disparity has persisted despite years of debate about how it should be addressed. Second, there is conflicting evidence about the outcomes of gifted programs. Specific interventions have a solid research base (see Plucker & Callahan, this issue), but less well-defined interventions have shown mixed results (Adelson, McCoach, & Gavin, 2012; Bui, Craig, & Imberman, 2014).  

To some degree, both of these issues can be traced to the selection process for gifted programs. For example, the low proportion of Black students in these programs can be attributed, at least in part, to poorly designed approaches to determining which students will receive services, such as when school leaders rely on referrals from teachers and parents (Grissom, Redding, & Bleiberg, 2019; McBee, Peters, & Miller, 2016). For that matter, even a seemingly “objective” selection process can favor students who aren’t likely to benefit from the program, while excluding those who would. In one study, for example, students identified by a high IQ score were placed in the same gifted class as students identified through an achievement test; the students identified with an IQ test showed no benefit, while those with high achievement test scores did (Card & Giuliano, 2014).   

Best practices in student identification 

The field of gifted education has learned much about how to select students and how to think more broadly about what successful identification looks like. But there is no magic bullet to solve the problem of inequity in gifted education. Lack of equity is caused by a number of factors, some of which are outside of educators’ control. For example, there is only so much that teachers and administrators can do to ameliorate the effects of poverty and its role in student achievement (Plucker & Peters, 2018). Further, state laws and rules vary widely, with some even mandating problematic practices such as extreme test score requirements or national norms (Plucker et al., 2018).  

Gifted programs won’t become truly equitable until the nation addresses a host of larger societal problems.

If schools were simply to stop using flawed selection processes, replacing them with research-supported alternatives, that would likely go a long toward increasing the identification rates for students of color (see Lee, Ottwein, & Peters, 2020; Worrell & Dixson, 2018). Gifted programs won’t become truly equitable until the nation addresses a host of larger societal problems. In the meantime, though, we can make significant progress by relying on a number of best practices, as described below.  

Establish the purpose 

As with any good program, planning is key. But planning can be difficult if a school doesn’t know why or for whom it is offering a service. At some point, preferably up front, a school must decide on a what or a who. Either it can start with a goal (e.g., more kids taking Advanced Placement math classes) and then find the kids who are most likely to benefit from such a program, or it can start with a group of kids who seem underchallenged (e.g., the top 5% of kids in the school), and then figure out what kinds of programs those kids need. An effective identification system can be designed based on either choice. However, when schools neglect to give careful consideration to the kind of program they want to offer, or who they want to serve, they tend to make bad decisions, ending up with a program and a selection process that don’t go together.  

For example, school leaders often set their gifted criteria at the 95th percentile of a nationwide standardized test, without stopping to think through the implications of that decision. At first glance, that cutoff point may seem to make good sense: The top 5% of students are likely to benefit from more challenging instruction. But, in reality, the test won’t identify the top 5% of students in their district; the only local students it will flag for services are those who who are performing in the top 5% of the nation. In some schools, this will mean that no students meet the criteria; some of them might be performing at a level far above their classmates, but since they aren’t in the top 5% nationwide, their school won’t see fit to give them more challenging work.  

Similarly, if they haven’t thought carefully about the kinds of talent they want to develop, teachers and administrators will often assume that students should be identified for gifted programs based on their test scores in math and reading. In effect, though, this is to make a passive choice about the kind of program being offered: Only students who are advanced in math and reading will be selected, leaving out students who are doing high-level work in science, music, or other subjects. 

Thus, the first and most important rule for identifying students for gifted programs is to set a clear goal from the start, and to set selection criteria on the basis of that goal. Either the program exists to challenge X students at their level of need and readiness, or it exists to help more kids achieve Y. Without making clear and explicit choices about who and/or what the gifted program is meant to accomplish, it will end up serving the wrong students.  

Focus on needs and services, not labels 

When schools provide students with advanced learning opportunities, they need to make sure those are the right opportunities, focusing on the content and the level of work that have been identified as appropriate for those students. For instance, if students are to be offered an accelerated math class (e.g., combining pre-algebra and algebra in one year), then the identification process should measure that they actually have the mathematical knowledge and skills needed to do well in such a class.  

This means also that the identification of students for advanced learning opportunities should be seen as temporary and context specific. There’s no reason to assume, for instance, that if a student requires an accelerated algebra class this year, then she’ll need an accelerated class next year as well. Rather, the question should be, “Does this specific program meet this student’s needs at this time?” In brief, the point isn’t to identify talented students (stamping them with that label in permanent ink), but to identify talented students in context and to match them with appropriate services that will benefit them in the moment.   

Cast a wide net 

Although some in the anti-testing movement don’t like to admit it, one of the great equity success stories of the last 15 years is the implementation of universal ACT or SAT testing by states. For example, as a result of implementing universal ACT testing for all high school juniors in 2007, the State of Michigan found nearly 50% more college-ready students from low-income families (Hyman, 2017). These were students who, before universal testing, might never have gone  to college or even taken the ACT.  

Higher education institutions, directors of exam schools, and gifted education researchers have long argued that the greater the numbers of students tested, the less likely we’ll be to overlook students who would have benefitted from the program — historically, a disproportionate number of those overlooked students have been Black, Latinx, and/or from low-income families. 

Of course, it costs more money to test all students and (since this will lead to the identification of more students who need advanced learning opportunities) expand gifted programs. But if we want to identify students for these services more accurately and equitably, then this is a cost we must bear.   

Too often, we’ve seen districts overhaul their identification systems, using the strategies we suggest, but fail to expand their gifted programs, due to the increased expense. In effect, having identified larger numbers of students to receive services, they try to carve up the pie into smaller and smaller pieces. Inevitably, this leads to conflicts over access to school resources, since every time a new student is identified for these opportunities, another student sees their own opportunities diminish (e.g., see the recent struggles over who is admitted to specialized high schools in New York City and Fairfax County, Virginia). When we work with school districts on these issues, we often encourage them to bake a bigger pie, expanding their gifted programs to meet the growing need for such services. We understand that the complex politics of school funding stand in the way, but we wish more districts would take our advice. 

Choose the right comparisons 

As we noted earlier, schools often identify students for gifted programs by using national normative comparisons — for example, by deciding that all students scoring above 95% on a national test qualify for the service. But this makes little sense. At some schools, no students score at this level. And yet, in every school there are students who perform at a higher lever than their peers and would benefit from an additional challenge. Should a school ignore the needs of its high-flying students just because those children aren’t flying quite as high as students in other parts of the country? 

Should a school ignore the needs of its high-flying students just because those children aren’t flying quite as high as students in other parts of the country? 

As a rule, each school should design its GT services to meet the needs of its local population, rather than trying to conform to some national perspective on who counts as gifted. That is, if a school is going to provide additional services for students who need a greater challenge, then it should select the top X% of its own students. This has two main benefits. First, it makes more sense from the standpoint of who gifted programs are supposed to serve. The Every Student Succeeds Act of 2018 makes clear that the target population for gifted and talented services are those students who “need services or activities not ordinarily provided by the school.” That is, GT programs are meant to benefit those children who are performing at a high level relative to their schoolmates, not relative to students who are performing at a high level nationally. Second, multiple studies have shown that identifying students for gifted services based on local norms tends to result in far greater equity than using national, state, or even district norms (Peters, Makel, & Rambo-Hernandez, in press).  

Be proactive about equity 

Any program selection process will miss some students it should have identified. In assessment, these are called false negatives. In some cases, this happens at random (e.g., someone forgot to upload the correct form), but in most cases, students are missed because of some underlying reason that has nothing to do with their academic performance. For example, they might be ready for advanced physics, but they scored poorly on the physics test because they’re still learning English and didn’t understand the test instructions. Or perhaps they would have scored at a high level, but they’ve never taken this kind of test before and their family wasn’t able to afford a test-prep program.   

Identification systems should be proactive in finding and eliminating such obstacles, making sure that no students are denied gifted services for the wrong reasons. In New York City, for example, some exam-based high schools used to require students to take the admissions test at the school on a particular day, but some students would always miss the test because they had no way to get to the testing site at that time. To address the problem, some of the schools now offer their admissions test at the student’s home school during a regular school day. Similarly, New York and Boston now offer free test-preparation programs for students who cannot afford to pay for them, and Florida allows schools to adopt alternative identification policies for students who are non-native English speakers or are eligible for free or reduced-price meals.  

It’s not enough to say that a system is available to everyone. Instead, identification systems need to take proactive, affirmative steps to find every student who would benefit from a GT program. Yet, as important as it is to be proactive about equity, we must avoid the temptation to comb the desert in search of the perfect identification process, one that ensures that the makeup of the students receiving GT services precisely mirrors that of the larger student population. The United States is a very unequal country, and as long as some students have access to every resource and privilege imaginable, while others struggle to find enough to eat, we will see unequal performance on any valid assessment, even if schools take proactive steps to identify students more equitably.   

Be careful when using multiple measures  

Experts in gifted education have long recommended using multiple measures or criteria to determine eligibility for advanced education (National Association for Gifted Children, 2008). These include objective measures, such as standardized tests, but also subjective measures, such as performance assessments. But in recent years, it has become clear that such an approach can be harmful when implemented the wrong way. For example, when Jonathan Plucker was a coordinator of enrichment programs in an elementary school, he was required to use a multiple criteria system in which students had to perform at a high level on every metric. As a result, very few students were identified for GT services, and the program lacked any race and class diversity. Further, using multiple criteria means using more measures, and those extra instruments (e.g., parent, teacher, or student self-rating scales) are often subjective. The greater the reliance on raters’ personal judgment, the greater the likelihood that biases will skew the results.   

So how does one decide how to combine multiple measures? First, multiple criteria systems that require high performance on every measure are generally inappropriate, because, for most gifted services, the risk of negative outcomes due to an inappropriate placement is low. For example, if a student is placed in accelerated math, but it doesn’t go well, the negative effects are relatively modest. Systems should be designed to be inclusive — to err on the side of letting kids into a service rather than on keeping them out. In addition, educators should consider whether their additional measures are injecting more bias into their process, and whether that bias is helping or hurting the ability of the process to identify children in need of advanced services, and to do so equitably. For example, teacher recommendations might help some disadvantaged students access services, but requiring a teacher referral could hold some students back.  

More services for more students 

Every year, many students arrive at school working well above grade level, and some of them may need additional challenges, by way of accelerated courses, enrichment programs, or any of the many other strategies for providing a more rigorous education. Historically, the nation’s schools have struggled to identify those students accurately. Over the past decade, however, we’ve seen tremendous growth in our understanding of how best to select students for advanced learning services, ensuring that all children have fair and equitable opportunities to develop their skills and talents. 

We anticipate that this perspective will seem counterintuitive to many people, in that it flies in the face of a familiar line of criticism, which portrays gifted education programs as inherently elitist and inequitable. Within the field of advanced education, we can only keep working hard to show that such criticism is wrong, and that if public education is to be truly equitable and effective, then it must find ways to meet the needs of all children, including those who are ready for greater challenges.  

At the same time, we anticipate that our views will seem objectionable to others, especially those parents and educators who have had to fight hard over many years to get services for their very talented children and students, and who fear that a more inclusive approach will reduce or eliminate those services. To them, we can only reiterate that a more inclusive approach to gifted and advanced education, when designed and implemented carefully, will not remove services. Instead, it will “expand the pie,” resulting in a more equitable education system that meets the needs of all students. The question is not whether our schools can provide such services to larger number of children, but whether our leaders are willing to provide the necessary resources.    
References 

Adelson, J.L., McCoach, D.B., & Gavin, M.K. (2012). Examining the effects of gifted programming in mathematics and reading using the ECLS-K. Gifted Child Quarterly, 56 (1), 25-39.  

Bui, S., Craig, S., & Imberman, S. (2014). Is gifted education a bright idea? Assessing the impact of gifted and talented programs on students. American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, 6 (3), 30-62.  

Card, D. & Giuliano, L. (2014). Does gifted education work? For which students? (NBER Working Paper No. 20453). Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research. 

Grissom, J.A., Redding, C., & Bleiberg, J.F. (2019). Money over merit?: Socioeconomic gaps in receipt of gifted services. Harvard Education Review, 89 (3), 337-369.  

Hyman, J. (2017). ACT for all: The effect of mandatory college entrance exams on postsecondary attainment and choice. Education Finance and Policy, 12 (3), 281-311.  

Lee, L.E., Ottwein, J.K., & Peters, S.J. (2020). Eight universal truths of identifying students for advanced academic interventions. In J.H. Robins, J.L. Jolly, F.A. Karnes, & S.M. Bean (Eds.), Methods and materials for teaching the gifted (5th ed., pp.61-80). Waco, TX: Prufrock Press. 

McBee, M.T., & Peters, S.J., & Miller, E.M. (2016). The impact of the nomination stage on gifted program identification: A comprehensive psychometric analysis. Gifted Child Quarterly, 60, 258-278. 

National Association for Gifted Children. (2008). The role of assessments in the identification of gifted students. Washington, DC: Author.  

Peters, S.J., Gentry, M., Whiting, G.W., & McBee, M.T. (2019). Who gets served in gifted education? Demographic proportionality and a call for action. Gifted Child Quarterly, 63 (4), 273-287.  

Peters, S.J., Makel, M.C., & Rambo-Hernandez, K. (in press). Local norms for gifted and talented student identification. Everything you need to know. Gifted Child Today.  

Plucker, J.A. & Callahan, C.M. (2020). The evidence base for advanced learning programs. Phi Delta Kappan, 101 (4), 14-21.  

Plucker, J.A., Glynn, J., Healey, G., & Dettmer, A. (2018). Equal talents, unequal opportunities: A report card on state support for academically talented low-income students (2nd ed.). Lansdowne, VA: Jack Kent Cooke Foundation. 

Plucker, J.A. & Peters, S.J. (2018). Closing poverty-based excellence gaps: Conceptual, measurement, and educational issues. Gifted Child Quarterly, 62, 56-67.  

Worrell, F.C. & Dixson, D.D. (2018). Recruiting and retaining underrepresented gifted students. In S. Pfeiffer (Ed.), Handbook of giftedness in children (2nd ed., pp. 209-226). New York, NY: Springer.