Gifted education by country

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Gifted education is a specialised area of education in many different countries.

Global implementation

Canada

In Canada, the Peel District School Board has various high schools with Regional programs to provide students an opportunity to develop and explore skills in a particular area of interest. Among these Regional Programs is the Regional Enhanced Program. Students identified as gifted (labelled as "enhanced" instead) may choose to attend these high schools instead of their mainstream school. In the Regional Enhanced Program, enhanced students take core courses (primarily, but not limited to English, mathematics, and the sciences) in an environment surrounded by fellow enhanced peers. The classes often contain modified assignments that encourage students to be creative.

India

In India, Jnana Prabodhini Prashala started in 1968, is probably the first school for gifted education. The motto is motivating intelligence for social change. The psychology department of Jnana Prabodhini has worked on J. P. Guilford's model of Intelligence.

Iran

National Organization for Development of Exceptional Talents (NODET, also known as SAMPAD, Persian: سمپاد, which stands for سازمان ملی پرورش استعدادهای درخشان in Persian) are national Middle and High Schools in Iran developed specifically for the development of exceptionally talented students in Iran. NODET was first established in 1976 and re-established in 1987.

Admission to NODET schools is selective and based on a comprehensive nationwide entrance examination procedure.

Every year thousands of students apply to enter the schools, from which less than 5% are chosen for the 99 middle schools and 98 high-schools within the country. All applicants must have a minimum GPA of 19 (out of 20) for attending the entrance exam. In 2006, 87,081 boys and 83,596 girls from 56 cities applied, and finally 6,888 students were accepted for the 2007 middle schools. The admission process is much more selective in big cities like Tehran, Isfahan, Mashhad and Karaj in which less than 150 students are accepted after two exams and interviews, out of over 50,000 applicants.

Four top schools of NODET (and also Iran's top) are Allameh Helli High School and Farzanegan High School located in Tehran, Shahid Ejei High School located in Isfahan, Shahid Hashemi Nejad High School located in Mashhad and Shahid Soltani School located in Karaj^{[citation needed]}. Courses taught in NODET schools are college-level in fields such as Biology, Chemistry, Mathematics, Physics and English Language. The best teachers of the ministry of education are chosen mainly by the school's principal and faculty to teach at NODET schools. Schools mainly have only two majors (normal schools have three majors), math-physics and experimental sciences (like math-physics but having biology as the main course). Even though social sciences are taught, there is much less emphasis on these subjects due to the lack of interest in both students and the organization.

NODET students are very successful in scientific Olympiads, occupying almost all places in the national Olympiads, and doing great in many international Olympiads.

Statistics show that NODET alumni usually pursue higher education until post-graduate level^{[citation needed]}. Some NODET alumni are world class leading researchers in Science, Engineering, and Medicine.

Republic of Ireland

The Centre for the Talented Youth of Ireland has run in Dublin City University since 1992.

Republic of Korea

Following the Gifted Education Promotion Law (영재교육진흥법)in the year 2000, the Ministry of Education, Science, and Technology (MEST) founded the National Research Center for Gifted and Talented Education (NRCGTE) in 2002 to ensure effective implementation of gifted education research, development, and policy. The center is managed by the Korean Educational Development Institute (KEDI). Presently twenty-five universities conduct gifted and talented education research in some form; for example at the Seoul National University Science-gifted Education Center, KAIST Global Institute for Talented Education (GIFTED), the Korean Society for the Gifted and Talented (한국영재교육학회) and the Korean Society for the Gifted (사단법인 한국영재학회).

Education for the scientifically gifted in Korea can be traced back to the 1983 government founding of Gyeonggi Science High School. Following three later additions (Korea Science Academy of KAIST; Seoul Science High School and Daegu Science High School), approximately 1,500, or 1 in 1,300 (0.08 percent) of high school students are currently enrolled among its four gifted academies. By 2008, about 50,000, or 1 in 140 (0.7 percent) of elementary and middle school students participated in education for the gifted. In 2005, a program was undertaken to identify and educate gifted children of socioeconomically underprivileged people. Since then, more than 1,800 students have enrolled in the program.

Gradually the focus has expanded over time to cover informatics, arts, physical education, creative writing, humanities, and social sciences, leading to the 2008 creation of the government funded Korean National Institute for the Gifted Arts. To pluralize the need for trained professional educators, teachers undergo basic training (60 hours), advanced training (120 hours), and overseas training (60 hours) to acquire skills necessary to teach gifted youth.

Netherlands

In the Netherlands these schools are called the Leonardoschool. They are popular and growing fast.

United Kingdom

The National Academy for Gifted and Talented Youth ran 2002 to 2007 at the University of Warwick. Warwick University decided not to reapply for the contract to run NAGTY in 2007, instead introducing its own programme, the International Gateway for Gifted Youth in 2008. In January 2010, the government announced that NAGTY was to be scrapped the following month.

United States

In the United States, each state department of education determines if the needs of gifted students will be addressed as a mandatory function of public education. If so, the state determines the definition of which students will be identified and receive services, but may or may not determine how they shall receive services. If a state does not consider gifted education mandatory, individual districts may, thus the definition of what gifted is varies from state or district.

In contrast with special education, gifted education is not regulated on a federal level, although recommendations by the US Department of Education are offered. As such, funding for services is not consistent from state to state, and although students may be identified, the extent to which they receive services can vary widely depending upon a state or district's budget.

Hong Kong

Definition of Giftedness in Hong Kong

The Education Commission Report No.4 issued in 1990 recommended a policy on gifted education for schools in Hong Kong and suggested that a broad definition of giftedness using multiple criteria should be adopted.

Gifted children generally have exceptional achievement or potential in one or more of the following domains:

1. a high level of measured intelligence;
2. specific academic aptitude in a subject area;
3. creative thinking;
4. superior talent in visual and performing arts;
5. natural leadership of peers; and
6. psychomotor ability - outstanding performance or ingenuity in athletics, mechanical skills or other areas requiring gross or fine motor coordination;

The multi-dimensional aspect of intelligence has been promoted by Professor Howard Gardner from the Harvard Graduate School of Education in his Theory of Multiple Intelligences. In his introduction to the tenth anniversary edition of his classic work Frames of Mind. The theory of multiple intelligences, he says:

In the heyday of the psychometric and behaviorist eras, it was generally believed that intelligence was a single entity that was inherited; and that human beings - initially a blank slate - could be trained to learn anything, provided that it was presented in an appropriate way. Nowadays an increasing number of researchers believe precisely the opposite; that there exists a multitude of intelligences, quite independent of each other; that each intelligence has its own strengths and constraints; that the mind is far from unencumbered at birth; and that it is unexpectedly difficult to teach things that go against early 'naive' theories of that challenge the natural lines of force within an intelligence and its matching domains. (Gardner 1993: xxiii)

Howard Gardner initially formulated a list of seven intelligences, but later added an eighth, that are intrinsic to the human mind: linguistic, logical/mathematical, visual/spatial, musical, bodily kinesthetic, intrapersonal, interpersonal, and naturalist intelligences. It has become widely accepted at both local and international scales to adopt a broad definition of giftedness using multiple criteria to formulate gifted education policy.

The Mission and Principles of Gifted Education Policy in Hong Kong

The mission of gifted education is to systematically and strategically explore and develop the potential of gifted students. Gifted learners are to be provided with opportunities to receive education at appropriate levels in a flexible teaching and learning environment. The guiding principles for gifted education in Hong Kong are:

• Nurturing multiple intelligences as a requirement of basic education for all students and an essential part of the mission for all schools
• The needs of gifted children are best met within their own schools though it is recognized that opportunities to learn with similarly gifted students are important. Schools have an obligation to provide stimulating and challenging learning opportunities for their students
• The identification of gifted students should recognize the breadth of multiple intelligences
• Schools should ensure that the social and emotional, as well as the intellectual, needs of gifted children are recognized and met.

The Framework for Gifted Education in Hong Kong

Based on these guiding principles, a three-tier gifted education framework was adopted in 2000. Levels 1 & 2 are recognised as being school-based whilst Level 3 is the responsibility of the HKAGE. The intention is that Level 1 serves the entire school population, irrespective of ability, that Level 2 deals with between 2-10% of the ability group, and that Level 3 caters for the top 2% of students.

• Level 1:

A

To immerse the core elements advocated in gifted education i.e. High-order thinking skills, creativity and personal-social competence in the curriculum for ALL students;

B

To differentiate teaching through appropriate grouping of students to meet the different needs of the groups with enrichment and extension of curriculum across ALL subjects in regular classrooms.

• Level 2:

C

To conduct pull-out programmes of generic nature outside the regular classroom to allow systematic training for a homogeneous group of students (e.g. Creativity training, leadership training, etc.);

D

To conduct pull-out programme in specific areas (e.g. Maths, Arts, etc.) outside the regular classroom to allow systematic training for students with outstanding performance in specific domains.

• Level 3:

E

Tertiary institutions and other educational organizations / bodies, such as the Hong Kong Academy for Gifted Education and other universities in Hong Kong to provide a wide and increasing range of programmes for gifted students