Is Everyone's Child 90th percentile and above on the WPPSI III or just the DC's on this board?

[Anonymous]

The school she found probably isn't interested in having this kind of arrangement for a lot of children. It's hard to manage; it's essentially individualized instruction aka private tutoring.

[Anonymous]

Our DC tested 99.9, and is a happy, very well behaved, well mannered kid (loved by preschool teachers too ) - and was rejected everywhere. This was a few years ago, and at the time it was very upsetting - but it all worked out. We went public for a few years and it was a very positive overall - he may not have been challenged 24/7 and we did not request any special accommodations since the school did work with him (especially in reading), but he remained enthusiastic, did well socially and we supplemented with home enrichment - (plus, he read constantly on his own). By 2nd grade we realized that he needed more, and worked with a great consultant to help figure out our options (very scary, as I was nervous about further testing and the possibility that he'd be rejected all over again). Our advice was to look for small schools with "a rich curriculum that would allow our child to go in depth if necessary". Schools that openly differentiate by classroom and subject and are project oriented (especially for things such as math). In our case we didn't do a lot of searching for "tag" programs - the consultants actually told us to steer away from the "'Tag" programs, unless we were only considering public, which we were not. We wanted to keep things as "normal" as possible for dc while meeting his needs. We ended up at a small school in Virgnina - it has been wonderful. For the same reasons as the other poster, I would prefer to not name the school, however, we were told to look at the following Virginia schools, and, I'm sure with a little research, you could find similar models in DC - hope this is helpful - but- my advice is not to focus on the gifted label - it is a school that practices differentiation and is not so structured that they need to move on right away (or keep the kids in a pack) if the kids want to go deeper in a subject. Flexibility and depth seems to be the key (from our experiences at least). Schools named for us included Potomac, Burgundy, Browne, Flint Hill, and GDS (although we were cautioned that it may be very difficult to get accepted at GDS - we decided not to apply there, but will consider for HS). My opinion is that the 99.9 score (or whatever translates to that next gifted tier...) is a gamble because the kids tend to learn in a very different way that gets lost in translation.....). We have experienced this personally, and if we never had him tested, it would have been very difficult to understand - the learning differences are subtle, but can be significant if not properly addressed. Anyway- hope this is helpful.

[Anonymous]

Thank you, 11:45. That is a VERY helpful perspective.

[Anonymous]

If the mean score for ages 3-5 in this area on the WPPSI is say 95%-99.9%, don't you think the independent schools and testers should either find a more challenging IQ test for our brilliant/gifted population or create a new test that offers more of a realistic view of a child's performance capabilities???? I suppose when you compare kids in our area (largely from educated, two income families with larger than US averaged incomes and top preschool/early education opportunites, combined with parent-to-parent competition) to ESOL kids or kids without educated parents or from areas that provide little early ed opportunities, our kids will always score as such.

To sum up, I think it's ridiculous that so many kids are scoring 99.9%. (And yes, mine did score 99% as well) I say drop the testing altogether.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If the mean score for ages 3-5 in this area on the WPPSI is say 95%-99.9%, don't you think the independent schools and testers should either find a more challenging IQ test for our brilliant/gifted population or create a new test that offers more of a realistic view of a child's performance capabilities????

But why should the schools care exactly how gifted the kids are? My understanding is that they want to make sure kids meet some basic, somewhat advanced level. There are some hints that they are wary of the very highest scorers (because of possible accommodations needed), but the WPPSI already gives some hints of that.

For parents who are interested in establishing more accurate views of the potential of those highest scorers, there are other tests available. (Some say the Stanford-Binet long form gives the most information for the most highly gifted.)

[Anonymous]

Well I live in DC and my child did not score anywhere near 99th percentile. So your kids are really bright and maybe it does have to do with the educational level of the parents. We are not super educated just regular State Univeristy under grads. Ofcourse we want more for our child and hope that they will look at motivation and other factors and not just the score. But I can totally understand if a child in the 99th percentile gets picked over my own as long as they also have the other qualities. The school's have such hard decisions to make and spending a hour at a playdate is just not enough information so the scores are really helpful to the admissions people. The admission director at one of the schools told me the reason they require the test is it helps determine the future academic abilities of the child. Now does you child have to be 99th percentile to have future success or will 50th percentile do it? I guess they know from looking at their students as the progress through the grades and if only those in the 99th percentile do well then hey I don't blame them for only accepting 99th percentile kids. My real hope is that they don't lower the standards (whatever it is) for siblings, important kids or minorities.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:...The admission director at one of the schools told me the reason they require the test is it helps determine the future academic abilities of the child. Now does you child have to be 99th percentile to have future success or will 50th percentile do it? I guess they know from looking at their students as the progress through the grades and if only those in the 99th percentile do well then hey I don't blame them for only accepting 99th percentile kids. My real hope is that they don't lower the standards (whatever it is) for siblings, important kids or minorities.

It's generally recognized that they have an unofficial bottom line cut-off in the mid to high 80's. But we all know that academic success is only part intellectual capacity - and part work ethic, etc. So it gives them a lot of latitude.

It is also a fact that there are different standards for priority groups - although this tends to benefit legacies, siblings or otherwise connected children more than minority applicants because they get a pool of highly qualified minority applicants from whom to choose.

The differing standards from priority groups is one of the reasons that the children admitted from the non-priority groups are weighted so heavily to the higher percentiles - they are needed to be the high IQ water that helps raise all the boats, so to speak.

[Anonymous]

OK, I've been thinking about these issues for a few days now, and I am hoping to reach some closure. Please forgive the long post below. I am patching together a few key posts from earlier in this thread to set up context and summarize various comments. I also am trying to weed out the snark, since I think that just distracts from the discussion.

Someone who seems to have insider info wrote:99th percentile covers a large range of IQ - and this is noted in the test scores. 130 range is the low end and the best fit for private - above 145 [which translates to approximately 99.8%] is highly gifted and not as common - these kids typically are often the ones being declined - they require more accommodations and are often left out of the selection process.

I wrote:Interesting analysis. You seem to have very detailed info about how local schools view the WPPSI scores. Where did you learn this? Have you heard it directly from admissions people in the area? Did you read it in a book? Are you passing along a summary of comments you have read on DCUM? Could you please give some sourcing/explanation? Thanks.

Someone who seems to have insider info wrote:Combination of sources - good friend is a talented and gifted educator (general source), school principal (public school source),2 DC educational consultants (private school source), books and various gifted internet sources.

I wrote:Thanks. Which of these sources gave you the basis for your claim that: "above 145 ... these kids typically are often the ones being declined - they require more accommodations and are often left out of the selection process"? And what exactly did your source say? ... Thanks for relaying the input from your sources. I look forward to reading more specifics about what your source said on this topic (and which source it was) .... I am interested in the claim that children who score 145+ on a particular test are deemed less fitting candidates. This just strikes me as counter-intuitive.

New Poster A wrote:This actually struck me as quite plausible. Children who are extremely advanced are likely to need differentiated instruction, which smaller schools (as many privates are) are not set up to provide. A score at this level is extremely unusual. We're not talking about your garden-variety DCUM 99th+ percentile child, who is commonly described as bright but normal.

New Poster B wrote:I am a new poster to this thread. I believe that super-high-scoring children are often considered less desirable because they require far more differentiation and acceleration than is typical. Our child is one of those children, and most schools told us flat-out that they aren't set up to differentiate that much.

Several smart people wrote:[At this point, several people posted some very long and very good analysis about why schools that are designed to teach smart kids (those typically scoring in the 90-99% range) hypothetically might not be so interested in taking on students who are in the 99.8+%. I found these posts very interesting, and they overcame my earlier view that it would be "counter-intuitive" for schools to view high-scoring applicants as less desirable. Consider my questions answered in that regard.]

However, although I can now understand why schools hypothetically might view a 99.8+% score as a negative rather than a positive attribute, my other original question remains outstanding: Does anyone know whether any schools actually look at the world this way? Or is this just speculation that they might? I have spent some time searching the internet for any articles or other discussions that might address this issue, but I could not find any discussion other than what is posted on DCUM.

Any insight appreciated. If you have a comment, I'd especially be interested in knowing what your source is. Your own personal opinion?, an article?, a website?, a teacher from a DC school?, a former admissions director from another city? All have some validity, but it helps to know which is which. Also, I assume that different schools might approach this issue differently, i.e., some might view a high score as a positive and others might view it as a negative. Indeed, two different people in the same school might have opposing views. Finally, no need to encourage me to take it easy and not stress; I'm not really stressed about this issue or about applications, but rather just genuinely curious about how the process works. Thanks in advance for pointing me to good info -- I am often amazed at what good research the DCUM collective can generate, so I am hoping for some here.

[Anonymous]

Poster who mentioned not wanting schools to lower standards for minorities. Hold up! Are you saying that minorities need 'standards' lowered? If so, you really are uneducated. You have not met my 99.9%, 139+ IQ, reading at age 4 AFRICAN AMERICAN daughter, and oh--my 7 year old son who was admitted to a 'top tier' as this board calls it school not by his beautiful brown skin, but probably by his 95% test scores, above average/superior school performance. You greatly offended me, and a lot of other "minority" (and remember minority does not just mean African American) parents on here.

[Anonymous]

I think the missing factor in this discussion is that a very high IQ can play out in many different ways in terms of academic achievement. A child with a 150 IQ can be a quick learner who has very broad interests but is not way ahead of age-peers in terms of academic levels. Another child with a 150 IQ may be many grade levels ahead of peers in reading, or writing, or math, or everything. A third child with a 150 IQ may be off the charts in math, but on or slightly ahead in language arts. The first child would be easy to integrate into a school, the third, moderately challenging, the second very challenging.

I'm sure that a very high IQ is not a disqualification, at least at many private schools. My sources? I'm a psychologist who does assessments and I've seen these kids from a variety of schools, so they got in. In addition, my own high IQ child is at one of the highly competitive DC schools, and he definately has intellectual peers - a fair number of them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm sure that a very high IQ is not a disqualification, at least at many private schools. My sources? I'm a psychologist who does assessments and I've seen these kids from a variety of schools, so they got in. In addition, my own high IQ child is at one of the highly competitive DC schools, and he definately has intellectual peers - a fair number of them.

Many thanks for the thoughtful response (including the part I did not quote) and for the sourcing. Very helpful. Thanks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think the missing factor in this discussion is that a very high IQ can play out in many different ways in terms of academic achievement. A child with a 150 IQ can be a quick learner who has very broad interests but is not way ahead of age-peers in terms of academic levels. Another child with a 150 IQ may be many grade levels ahead of peers in reading, or writing, or math, or everything. A third child with a 150 IQ may be off the charts in math, but on or slightly ahead in language arts. The first child would be easy to integrate into a school, the third, moderately challenging, the second very challenging.

I'm sure that a very high IQ is not a disqualification, at least at many private schools. My sources? I'm a psychologist who does assessments and I've seen these kids from a variety of schools, so they got in. In addition, my own high IQ child is at one of the highly competitive DC schools, and he definately has intellectual peers - a fair number of them.

I agree with this, and my sources are a number of parents who have experience and direct feedback from admissions directors in NYC private schools. And, yes, I know, I know: DC is not New York... But the information is relevant because the situation there in terms of competition is even more severe: the top tier schools there get 900-1200 applicants for K versus 300 or so here. So - if any schools are looking for reasons not to have to accommodate non-priority applicants, it's NYC privates.

My understanding is that there are kids who are described as having the "whole package" - and that they are relatively rare, despite the large number of very high scoring applicants.

The "whole package" means basically a very high IQ showing intellectual capacity - but without prodigal-like non-synchronous academic achievement (the Doogie Houser types - not just a grade or two ahead in reading or math) - superior social skills with adults and other children, above-average attention span and impulse control, self-motivated drive to learn but also good ability to work cooperatively as part of a team, and - for lack of a better word - likability (or charm or charisma). And, this is also important and is generally communicated as part of the feedback from preschools - non-PITA parents.

For these children, the 99.8-99.9 IQ scores are not a drawback.

And, no, I'm not joking. I know I described what sounds like a "perfect" child of sorts - but, if you think about it, you have probably met one of these types of children at some point. I know I have. They stand out for many reasons, not just precocity.

[Anonymous]

How much ahead of time is it necessary in DC to schedule a child's testing? Say, if I wanted my dc tested in August, when should I call and schedule it?

Thanks!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How much ahead of time is it necessary in DC to schedule a child's testing? Say, if I wanted my dc tested in August, when should I call and schedule it?

Thanks!

August is not a busy time, so you should be okay if you call at the beginning of the month. The only thing to look out for is testers' vacations. But if you're really planning ahead, why not call the office now and ask what they recommend?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How much ahead of time is it necessary in DC to schedule a child's testing? Say, if I wanted my dc tested in August, when should I call and schedule it?

Thanks!

August is not a busy time, so you should be okay if you call at the beginning of the month. The only thing to look out for is testers' vacations. But if you're really planning ahead, why not call the office now and ask what they recommend?

Thanks - I know there have been threads on this - but any tester you recommend?