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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]OP here.  This is my fear.  That my child will be completely neglected in gen ed.  [b]But she doesn’t realistically belong in full time AAP [/b]either.  Are you supplementing?[/quote]

Yes she does.
Trust me. In the current model, of your child will be high-performing in gen ed, she will get a muuuuuuuch better education and much more attention from the teacher if she is in AAP instead of remaining in the gen ed class twiddling her thumbs as the teacher focuses all his/her time on assisting students who are 2-3 grades below benchmark. 
The spectrum is very, very wide in the typical gen ed classroom, as opposed to when we were kids, OP. If your child can do the work, but it will maybe be a bit of a struggle for her, you won’t regret pushing to get her into it
[/quote]

Sorry, no. Those 2-3 below benchmark kids will be pulled out for enrichment/extra work. The variety in the "gen ed" is actually not quite as wide as you suggest. At least it wasn't in our school. AAP may offer some additional curriculum, mostly in math, but by MS and HS it doesn't really matter. My kid killed MS honors math and is set up for an advance HS track. She was a "gen ed" kid. There many like her, too.[/quote]

As a teacher I can tell you this varies. Widely. It’s excellent that your child was able to thrive in gen ed. when it sounds like she could have functioned quite nicely alongside the AAP-identified students. In your case, it didn’t seem to be a detriment to her overall advancement through the system. That is not always the way it goes.  I usually advocate for kids on the bubble to get pushed into AAP in elementary because I do believe the research that suggests that kids —even the ones performing at the higher levels—benefit from that scenario. [/quote]

So then you admit it is not a gifted program. It's just a way to segregate any high-performing kid from the miscreants? Got it.[/quote]

No, it is a program for kids who are ahead of their peers and deserve to be challenged in school. Just like SPED is a program for kids who have some issues that make it harder for them to learn and need to be supported. Different needs for different kids. I understand that many people think that it is a waste to provide services for kids who are ahead of the learning curve but those kids should be provided an opportunity to learn at their pace. AAP removes the pressure for the Gen Ed Teacher to work with another group of kids, which gives the Gen Ed Teacher more time to work with the kids who are struggling and on grade level.

My son would have moved from one school that serves kids that are middle to upper middle class to a Center that serves kids that are middle to upper middle class. No one at our school is worried about "miscreants."  His favorite classes at school are his language, Level III, and Advanced Math. Why? They challenge him. He enjoys the other subjects but finishes the work easily and early and does the extra work on his own.

I don't understand the people who think that kids who are ahead should just sit around in the classroom and twiddle their thumbs, or work independently, while the Teacher focuses on the kids who are struggling and the kids on grade level.

Plenty of kids who are in Gen Ed will take AP and IB classes and go on to great colleges. AAP is not the end all and be all. The kids who are ahead benefit from AAP because they stay engaged in school, which is good for the kids. [/quote]

Exactly. [/quote]

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