Reply to Another article about the magnet programs in Washington Post

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]The data in the report shows the problem is two-fold.

1. Under-represented minorities are not applying. [b]There should be a survey to figure of the kids who scored high on the 2nd grade Raven test about why and whether they don't know about the programs, have low confidence they could get in or whether it's more about economic reasons like they have to take care of siblings or don't want to deal with the commute.[/b]

2. They are being accepted at much lower rates than whites and Asians. Is it possible that stronger candidates are not being encouraged to apply? That it's about bias in the test or in teacher or school recommendations? Other bias in the application process?

The thing that worries me is that maybe some highly or profoundly gifted minority students who are poor really aren't "prepared" for the HGC at the time of the application process in the same way as wealthy white or Asian children. They may be just as smart but they may be falling "behind" early on in terms of ambition, expectations, work habits, self-confidence and other factors in K-2. That could mean that we could waste a lot of time trying to fix the application criteria but should be focusing more on identifying these children earlier and giving them more opportunities very early on in their school career.[/quote]
I posted about this in another thread about the magnet report. We are AA, and we were contacted about a focus group to discuss why our daughter did not apply to the HGC. I assume we are contacted based other test scores. The focus group never actually happened though. I can't recall now if it was a weather  cancellation or what. This was a few years ago. We did not apply due to social reasons and the fact that her third grade teacher was  unyielding in her assessment that DD was not among the higher achieving students in the class. DD has scored highly on various standardized tests both before and since third grade. She actually had high MAP-MAP_r scores that year as well, but not high enough for that teacher to be supportive. 
What I didn't add in the other thread is that DD was accepted to a MS magnet, but we decided private is a better option.[/quote]

Smart move[/quote]

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