News Briefs

Gifted Gaps in High-Poverty Schools

Do high-poverty schools offer gifted and talented programs? What proportion of students in such schools participates in those programs? How does participation vary by race? Researchers supported by the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation and Institute addressed these questions in a recent report (Yaluma & Tyner, 2018). Using the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights’ school-level data and information from the National Center for Education Statistics, they reported these results. They found two thirds of elementary and middle schools at every poverty level have gifted programs with 8.9% of the students participating. However, far fewer students in high-poverty school actually participate in gifted programs (6.1%). Moreover, Black and Hispanic students were less likely to participate. They did find substantial variations across states with six states having 90% of their high-poverty schools with gifted programs whereas three states reporting less than 10%. To improve participation, the researchers suggested using universal screening and other ways to improve equity, using local norms, and employing a more diverse teaching force. To see their state-by-state analysis, visit https://edexcellence.net/publications/is-there-a-gifted-gap/

Increasing Access to Dual Enrollment Courses

The Education Commission of the States revisited dual enrollment practices to examine how more students might be included in these advanced courses and other precollegiate experiences (Zinth & Barnett, 2018). They reported state-set eligibility requirements limit dual enrollment to academically advanced students. Zinth and Barnett (2018) suggested middle-achieving high school students whose grades or assessment scores fall short of readiness measures not only can be successful, but also benefit from program participation. They describe promising approaches such as (a) differentiated dual enrollment and (b) precollegiate experiences. Differentiated dual enrollment offers programs of differing academic challenges to high-, middle- and lower-achieving students with assistance in helping them participate progressively in more rigorous options (e.g., dual enrollment with seminar or corequisite courses). Precollegiate experiences are activities that prepare students for subsequent college-level learning such as transition courses, summer bridge programs, college readiness brush-up programs, and on-campus college experiences.

Effective Teacher Policies

Given the premise that the “quality of an education system depends on the quality of its teachers,” the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD; 2018) examined international school policies that guide teachers’ selection, recruitment, and development (p. 4). OECD viewed teacher policy as concerned with three goals: attracting talented individuals to teaching and retaining them, developing effective teachers, and matching teachers with students in promoting excellent equitable, and inclusive learning. They reported these qualities as unique to teachers in high-performing countries and schools: A mandatory and extended period of clinical practice as part of the initial teacher education or of the induction period, the presence of opportunities for in-service teachers’ professional development, and teacher-appraisal mechanisms that focus on teachers’ continuous improvement. In addition, they found a positive relationship existing between schools’ responsibility for selecting teachers and improvements in students’ achievement scores in science, reading, and mathematics. Unfortunately, they found teachers in the most disadvantaged schools are less qualified and/or experienced than those in the most advantaged schools. The researchers concluded policies that need to focus on teachers becoming lifelong learners and inquisitive professionals, schools providing better leadership and more support to teachers in disadvantaged schools, and attracting better applicants to the profession by a combination of improving occupational status, work environment, sense of personal contribution, and financial rewards.

Teacher Perceptions of Evaluation

Although evaluation systems may be helpful as a way of examining multiple aspects of a teacher’s performance, they may not improve instruction. To improve practices, the recipient must perceive and accept the formal and informal feedback systems as valid and worthy. For this reason, the RAND Corporation studied the perceptions of 1,825 teachers toward their school’s evaluation and feedback systems (Tuma, Hamilton, & Tsai, 2018). These were some of their key findings:

The RAND researchers suggested that schools consider (a) less formal and more frequent feedback systems from colleagues rather than formal feedback systems from administrators, (b) highlighting how the school’s goal is to promote development and growth, and (c) providing resources to help teachers participate in the evaluation system and improve their practices.