Abstract
Scholars in the field of gifted education often lament the relative lack of research conducted on gifted students and advanced academic interventions. As a population whose development should be of broad interest for reasons of both human capital and self-fulfillment, advanced learners receive far too little attention outside of the work of a rather small circle of gifted education scholars. It is because of these concerns that readers interested in advanced academics have been excited to watch, as, over the last six years, scholars affiliated with the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) published five different papers related to gifted education. We were further encouraged by the fact that these studies made use of some of the most rigorous research methods available (e.g., regression discontinuity design [RDD] and propensity score matching) and drew upon datasets from some of the largest school districts in the nation (Dallas Independent School District [Texas], Broward County Schools [Florida], and other unnamed districts).
These studies are important for a few reasons. First, as a whole they address two of what we see as the most important and pressing issues facing the field of gifted education: (a) Do gifted services, as implemented, actually accomplish their purpose? and (b) How well are identification systems working to appropriately locate those students who are suited to take advantage of such services? In addition, these papers demonstrate the feasibility of methods such as RDD for answering some key questions in gifted education and confirm that large datasets do exist to inform those same questions. Finally, these papers throw down the gauntlet for those of us who believe that gifted programming is needed to challenge advanced learners. Not all of these studies’ findings are positive about “gifted education” services or practices, so they pose the challenge of conducting additional studies to tease out the reasons, conditions, and details that lie behind these authors’ conclusions. We cannot simply ignore what these researchers have to say or shy away from debating the issues they raise, simply because these issues have been raised using the scholarly lens of a different discipline. These papers alone cannot provide definitive rulings on any particular questions, but they contribute important knowledge that we as editors believe needs to be brought to greater prominence among our colleagues in the field of gifted education.
Those interested in reading the five full working papers on which the commentaries in this special issue are based can access them through the NBER. Many colleges and universities are subscribers to NBER, and we would urge anyone whose local library does not subscribe to request the relevant reports though interlibrary loan. Readers whose institutions are not subscribed to NBER also can pay a nominal fee to access individual papers. Below we provide reference citations and links to access each paper:
Bui, S. A., Craig, S. G., & Imberman, S. A. (2011). Is gifted education a bright idea? Assessing the impact of gifted and talented programs on achievement (National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper No. 17089). Retrieved from http://www.nber.org/papers/w17089
Card, D., & Giuliano, L. (2014). Does gifted education work? For which students? (National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper No. 20453). Retrieved from http://www.nber.org/papers/w20453
Card, D., & Giuliano, L. (2015). Can universal screening increase the representation of low income and minority students in gifted education? (National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper No. 21519). Retrieved from http://www.nber.org/papers/w21519
Colling, C. A., & Gan, L. (2013). Does sorting students improve scores? An analysis of class composition (National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper No. 18848). Retrieved from http://www.nber.org/papers/w18848
Davis, B., Engberg, J., Epple, D. N., Sieg, H., & Zimmer, R. (2010). Evaluating the gifted program of an urban school district using a modified regression discontinuity design (National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper No. 16414). Retrieved from http://www.nber.org/papers/w16414
In developing this special issue, we had hoped to allow the authors of each of the NBER papers to read the commentaries and then respond in a commentary of their own. Unfortunately, the authors were already planning to submit their work elsewhere, were unavailable, or did not respond to our inquiries. What follows are two commentaries on each of the five NBER papers followed by a final synthesis commentary written by the editor of the special issue and one of the co-editors of the Journal of Advanced Academics. We hope that bringing together the content of these commentaries by scholars working within the field of gifted education and the associated NBER papers will broaden the discussion and add to the overall knowledge base regarding advanced learners.