Who are the students who are at risk of dropping out of school, of learning to hate school, of becoming alienated from others or of drifting into crime? Based upon a broad definition of at risk, any student has the potential of becoming at risk by having to frequently accept failure as a common experience, by underachieving his/her potential ability, or by cognitively and/or physically being a dropout (AASA, 1989).
By reviewing research, student data, and case studies, professional educators know that a significant number of at risk students are gifted. Frequently, at risk gifted students go unrecognized and are inappropriately or inadequately served in our schools.
Is the old adage "gifted students will make it on their own" really a MYTH? In the state of Washington, one alternative high school found 13% of its entering students to be gifted; implying they had dropped out of school prior to making a decision to return to an alternative learning environment. Such students did not necessarily complete the alternative high school program. A sampling of incarcerated youth in our state indicates that conservatively, 3-5% of these young adults intellectually function in the superior or gifted range. Statistically information is not available for the number of gifted students who have committed suicide in the state of Washington, but a review of several individual scenarios indicated that many of the young people committing suicide in the Puget Sound area in the past four years demonstrated some qualities of giftedness.
Nationally, a report to Congress stated that 17.6% of gifted students drop out of school and that a majority of gifted students work at least 2-4 grade levels below their potential if not provided an appropriate education (Marland, 1972). Using a conservative definition for giftedness, Harvey and Seeley (1984) found 18% of youth entering a juvenile justice system in Colorado to be gifted. A study conducted on teenage suicide in four counties of Texas found 16% of those students to be gifted.
Certainly not all gifted students become at risk, however, the percentage appears high. In the course of this article, case studies and issues surrounding identification and programming options will be presented to provide the reader with insight into the complexity of the issue.
Melinda learned very quickly in elementary school, but her teacher would not let her work on division until the other students had completed multiplication. Though she was a voracious reader, the librarian would not allow her to check out fourth grade books as a second grader. Still, Melinda liked school and wanted to use her skills, so she pointed out her teacher's spelling and computational errors. She then received her first dose of negative feedback about being smart.
By junior high, Melinda was developing some coping skills. For example, by intentionally limiting her vocabulary and subverting her grades, she gained a tentative acceptance from a hitherto inaccessible wilder group. She play-acted a role with them that she was aware of but that they were not.
Drug and alcohol abuse began in junior high but tapered off in high school. She became disenchanted with the parties, but still attended. She often thought of suicide, and tried it once.
Since early childhood, Melinda had related best to people much older than herself. They seemed so much more mature than her age-mates. She was very close to a few of her teachers and excelled in their classes, though she did poorly in most. Her boyfriend of twenty-six had dropped out of school when he was sixteen and resented her being there. She accepted his physical and mental abuse, because with her low self-esteem, she perceived him as the kind of person she deserved. When she became pregnant, he knew he had her and she had found a way out of her misery.
Melinda later had an abortion and left her boyfriend. Despite all her doubts, a resilient inner core of a positive identity remained. Though she dropped out of school and worked in fast food restaurants for three years, she eventually entered college and her new world (Anderson, 1986).
With an early label as "trouble maker", John had difficulty with school from the beginning and was even considered for placement in a class for behaviorally disabled students. Concurrently, he was an avid reader.
His family life was characterized by turmoil. Divorce, frequent moves, and intervention by Child Protective Services marred his childhood. At the age of twelve, John started running away from home and was challenged to survive. Since this lifestyle required exceptional creativity to meet basic needs, he resorted to some illegal activities.
Currently, John is serving time in a juvenile detention center where he is in a class taught by a very sensitive teacher. The teacher noticed John's unusual ability to grasp concepts quickly, to fill in learning gaps, and to function as a charismatic leader. He describes John as a survivor.
How can educators find those students who need the services of a gifted program? Currently, most school districts depend on teachers and parents to recommend individual students. For a variety of reasons, an at-risk gifted child may not be perceived as gifted. Some at-risk gifted students live in highly mobile families, which prevent teachers from knowing a student well enough to recognize latent abilities. The parent(s) may lack the time and emotional energy to pursue appropriate opportunities for their child. Academically, by middle school, several years of low productivity and underachievement may reflect in depressed standardized test scores for students who were not identified at an early age. Unfortunately on occasion, due to language barriers, test bias, and the quality of assessment procedures, we do not identify at-risk gifted students who were referred and evaluated, and subsequently, denied access to gifted program options.
|
"At Risk Indicators" (AASA, 1989) |
Gifted Student Behavioral Manifestations (Seagoe & Hersey, 1977) |
||
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | Alienation from others | 1. | Seeks success and recognition; sensitive to criticism; vulnerable to rejection by peers; needs many types of groups; has problems in developing social leadership; overly critical of others |
| 2. | Dysfunctional family | 2. | Possesses heightened awareness, intuitiveness and sensitivity, AND feels a lack of control |
| 3. | Chemical dependency | 3. | Frustrated with inactivity and lack of progress; resistant to directions or authority figures |
| 4. | Poverty | 4. | Extremely sensitive to criticism; lacks basic competencies; low self-esteem; easily disillusioned by social injustices |
| 5. | Mobility of the family | 5. | Seeks structure, order and consistency, invents own value system |
| 6. | Language and cultural differences | 6. | Needs specialized reading assistance early; parent resistance to reading; escapes into verbalisms; needs help in exploring and developing interests; needs flexible and individualized program options |
| 7. | Juvenile delinquency | 7. | Shows non-conforming behavior; problems with rejection and rebellion; extremely stubborn; low self-concept; lacks peer acceptance; rebels against too much direction |
| 8. | Several early school failures | 8. | Critical attitude towards others, discouraged by self-criticism; rejects interruptions |
In order to identify gifted children who are at risk, the following practices need to be considered:
Because the gifted population is not homogeneous, meeting the academic, social and emotional needs of at risk gifted students necessitates schools respond to three areas of the school organization: (1) age-level requirements, (2) grade-level emphasis on curriculum and instruction, and (3) class scheduling. For some at risk gifted students, the focus needs to be on intellectual peers instead of age-mates as time to interact with intellectual peers is a necessary experience. To meet that need, Melinda sought a relationship with a boyfriend ten years older than herself.
The issue of grade-level knowledge and skills is not necessarily relevant to many highly gifted students as observed with John. Emphasis would be better placed on using individual planning and flexible pacing of instruction based upon a student's performance. It should be possible for an eight year old gifted student to study fifth grade mathematics if that is his/her instructional level.
The inflexibility of schools schedules is often frustrating to the gifted student. Just when he/she is ready to study a topic of interest in-depth, the bell rings or the unit of study is terminated and an entirely different one is undertaken by the class. The gifted student feels no control over what he/she can learn and frequently becomes resentful.
Figure 2 highlights programming options which have been recommended to address many of the critical needs of at risk gifted students. In addition, administrators need to recognize that inappropriate gifted program services may intensify identified gifted students becoming at risk.
In summary, programming options need to be "designed to bolster students' current knowledge of subject content, extend their capacities for learning, and enhance their life experiences" (Alamprese & Erlanger, 1989, viii). Certainly at risk gifted students cannot be treated as a group with similarities, but more as individual who need to be perceived in terms of the whole child. This means that individualized planning occurs to enable the student to access a variety of school and community resources and learning options.
|
Critical Needs of At Risk Gifted Student (Hanninen & Lynch, 1985) |
Programming Options (Alamprese & Erlanger, 1989) |
||
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | Positive relationship with an adult role | 1. | Mentorships, apprenticeships, job shadowing |
| 2. | Learning of values and valuing education | 2. | Provide enrichment experiences, topical seminars, and indepth study in an area of each student's interest, group counseling |
| 3. | Decision-making skills to support making appropriate choices | 3. | Train in specific decision-making and problem solving skills and complemented by participation in such programs as Odyssey of the Mind or Future Problem Solving Bowl |
| 4. | Appropriate pacing of academic training | 4. | Use flexible scheduling, grade or course acceleration, advanced subject placement, option of challenging or testing out of course units or classes, community college or university course placement, telecourse offerings, night school classes |
The incidence of giftedness among at risk students is high. To reach at risk gifted students, it is necessary to educate teachers and administrators about the nature and needs of such students as several stereotypes of the classic gifted student need to be changed. The diversity and complexity of at risk gifted students and their stories is great, but when identified early, successes do occur as high! lighted in the following case.
Edward is now a fifth grade student in a self-contained gifted program classroom. However, his first experiences in school involved him in special preschool programs for students with severe language delays. He achieved tremendous growth and was nominated for the gifted program early in second grade. His principal was a strong advocate as she was convinced that Edward had special abilities. Without the use of an identification model reflecting the concepts of multiple intelligences and the need to recognize behavior characteristics of culturally diverse gifted children, he would have been missed. However, the combination of advocacy, early intervention, and flexibility worked, and his academic placement is serving him well.
"With advocacy, early intervention, andflexibility, Edward, a potentially at risk gifted student is doing well.
Alamprese, J. S. and Erlanger, W. J., (1 989). No gift wasted: Effective strategies for educating highly able, disadvantaged students in mathematics and science. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office
American Association of School Administrators (1989). Students at risk: Problems and solutions. Arlington, VA
Anderson, J. D. (I 986). Gifted students in alternative programs. Options in Education, 3, (1), 10.
Gardner, H. (1983). Frames of mind. New York: Basic Books, Inc.
Hanninen, G. and Lynch, A. (I 985). Highly capable incarcerated youth project committee summary. Olympia, WA: Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction (unpublished).
Harvey, S. and Seeley, K. R. (1 984). An investigation of the relationships among intellectual and creative abilities, extracurricular activities, achievement and giftedness in a delinquent population. Gifted Child Quarterly, 28, 2, pp. 73-79.
Marland - U.S. Commissioner of Education (1972). Education of the gifted and talented: Report to the Congress of the United States. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office.
Roedell, W. (1989). Early development of gifted children. In J. L. Van Tassel-Baska and P. Olszewski-Kubilius (eds.), Patterns of influence on gifted learners: The home, the self, and the school. New York: Teachers College Press.
Seagoe, M. and Hershey, M. (1 977). Characteristics of gifted children. In E. Duke, Star power: Providing for the gifted and talented, Module 2. Austin, TX: Educational Service Center.
Sternberg, R. J. and Davidson, J. E. (eds.) (1986). Conceptions of giftedness. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Dr. Gail Hanninen is Supervisor of Gifted Education and Dropout Prevention Programs at the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI) Olympia, WA. Paula Fascilla coordinates gifted programs in Tacoma School District, Tacoma, WA. John Anderson is Supervisor of Schools for the 21st Century at OSPI, Olympia, WA.