News

Education

Time tests gifted task force

The group that will recommend a centralized program has much to figure out by April 1.

By TOM MARSHALL, Times Staff Writer
Published December 17, 2007

---

ADVERTISEMENT

BROOKSVILLE - There's a new committee in town these days, and it's building a school for gifted children.

Make that a center. Or a program. Or all of the above.

Whatever it's supposed to be doing, the Hernando County School Board's new gifted education task force faces an April 1 deadline to submit its recommendations. And the product of its work - that thing they're building - is due to be filled with kids next August.

Every School Board member but Dianne Bonfield agreed in October to create the task force, with an eye toward developing a centralized gifted program for the 2008-09 school year.

For members of the task force - who tend to describe their job in terms of building a complete school within an existing building like Parrott Middle School, Challenger K-8 School of Mathematics and Science or the new Explorer K-8 - the time line is daunting.

"I think it's an awful lot to expect to get done," said chairwoman Cindy Hall last week. "I feel overwhelmed."

At recent meetings the task force has been talking about the need to hire teachers, make sure they're certified to teach gifted students, hire a sympathetic administrator, find a curriculum, assess children on their particular needs and develop their state-mandated Educational Plans.

They've asked the district facilities department for help with the question of where to put it all when school starts in nine months.

But superintendent Wayne Alexander tends to see the committee's task in simpler terms.

He believes they're designing a center within an existing school, and students might float in and out over the course of the day, depending on their needs.

"Giving them the opportunity to run with that particular gift without any exclusivity," Alexander said. "Kids won't necessarily spend the whole day attending that center or school-within-a-school."

That view came as a surprise to several task force members, including David Katcher, an assessment specialist at Chocachatti Elementary School.

"It's my understanding we were tasked to create a full-time gifted program," he said.

- - -

School Board members did weigh in on that question, sort of.

Among the 12 items on their list of task force objectives was the question, "Will the program be self-contained or will students move in and out based on their gifted area?"

The task force - which includes central office staff and a group of parents who support the needs of gifted children - was also asked to review existing practices across the county and state and recommend a high- quality program.

Members said they're eyeing exemplary programs in Sarasota, Pinellas, Volusia and Palm Beach counties.

Hernando also has applied to administer the state's gifted education endorsement and may be able to start training teachers for that speciality this winter, said special education director Kathy Dofka.

But funding is uncertain. Board member Jim Malcolm has said the new gifted program would likely use about $1.5-million in existing funds, transferring many gifted teachers from their current assignments at other schools.

Task force members also worry about how to notify parents of the fast-developing program, and how to tailor it to meet individual children's needs by August.

"I really think we need to assess every child before we go into a school-within-a-school, and use a unified assessment tool," said Mary Ann Bozeman, a gifted education teacher at Parrott Middle School. "I know that's a Herculean task."

Under state law, gifted students are treated as special-needs students and bring in about $2,100 in extra per-student funding.

"Gifted" is defined as scoring at least two standard deviations above the mean IQ score, and qualifying in at least one category on a state checklist. Under law, such students must receive appropriate services once they're identified.

But Florida's 67 counties vary widely in terms of both the quality and extent of such services.

At one extreme, Alachua County identified 11.7 percent of its elementary student population as gifted during the 2005-06 school year, and Miami-Dade counted 6.2 percent of its 170,000-student body at that level, according to the most recent state Department of Education figures.

Hernando County called just 1.7 percent of its elementary population gifted that year, against a state average of 3.7, while 10 counties found less than 1 percent.

Since then, Hernando has improved, finding 2.5 percent, or 575 students this fall.

But they're distributed unevenly, with 42 at both the Chocachatti and Challenger K-8 magnet schools, and fewer than 10 each at Deltona, Westside, Brooksville and Eastside elementary schools.

"There's a strong sense that we haven't identified enough gifted kids," Alexander said.

But with research showing that many children are gifted in just a single area, he said it might not be appropriate to separate most of them from the general population at the new gifted center.

"When you walk into a school, I don't necessarily want you to know who the gifted kids or the special-needs kids are," Alexander said.

Tom Marshall can be reached at tmarshall@sptimes.com or (352) 848-1431.

2.5: percentage of Hernando elementary students who are gifted

42: Number of gifted students at Challenger K-8 and Chocachatti schools. Other schools have fewer than 10

$1.5M: Estimated cost to fund the new gifted program

[Last modified December 16, 2007, 19:32:49]

[an error occurred while processing this directive]