Parents can spend more than $20,000 a year on tutoring for the selective schools test, says NSW Department of Education secretary Mark Scott. Credit:Janie Barrett Jae Jung, from the University of NSW, said gifted students should be given as much attention as special needs students. The government's review will look at replacing the selective schools test with "computer-adaptive IQ tests that assess cognitive skills, student work portfolios" or "problem-solving tasks that rely more on higher-order and critical thinking skills", Mr Scott said. "[These are] all harder to prepare for than through tutoring or test familiarisation." The test has three 40-minute multiple choice sections on reading, maths and general ability and a 20-minute writing task.

This year, a record 14,458 year 6 students sat the test, competing for 4226 places across 19 fully selective and 29 partially selective schools. Less than a third of hopeful students gain entry into the schools, which tailor the curriculum for gifted students and overwhelmingly rank among the top in the state for HSC results. Of these, less than 3 per cent will come from the lowest socioeconomic quartile, despite research showing that giftedness is more evenly distributed across the population. "As coaching booms we are seeing a decline in the proportion of low socioeconomic students gaining entry into selective schools," Mr Scott said. "It isn't difficult to join the dots."

Mr Scott said the review of the test was aimed at ensuring all students who belong in selective schools "feel that that is a pathway open to them". "I think there's an argument that some families might just feel that the cost involved with coaching makes it not worthwhile for their children to even apply," he said. "Assessment has advanced considerably since we developed our entry test procedures [in 1989] ... as the research has improved, as has the technology, we need to look and see if there are better ways to assess the academic achievement and potential of our brightest students." Founder and chief executive of tutoring service Art of Smart, Rowan Kunz, welcomed a broadening of the entry test but said parents would keep paying for training in any new test components. "There are studies that show with practice you can significantly improve IQ test results and I'd be interested to see how portfolios are managed ... we've all heard of amazing science projects that are done by the parents," Mr Kunz said.

The review of the selective entry test and the NSW government's wider gifted and talented education policy will be completed this year, but Mr Scott said any changes to the test "would not take place for some time ... we would give considerable notice". Mr Scott also flagged a greater focus on gifted and talented students outside selective schools, in a bid to stem Australia's sliding performance in national and international assessments. The proportion of Australian students achieving the top two bands in maths, reading and science in the OECD's Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) tests fell significantly from 20 per cent, 17 per cent and 15 per cent, respectively in 2000 to 11 per cent in 2015 for all three areas. "Across many measures, not enough high potential Australian students are achieving their academic talent," Mr Scott said. "The policy will for the first time incorporate high potential students, students above the average range who have the potential to achieve highly. This would include a broad range of students who are underachieving or may have missed out on identification as gifted students."

Mr Scott said following the changes, "all schools will have a critical mass of students above the average range that need to be challenged and supported". To help schools cater to these students, the updated policy would look at promoting "academic acceleration for gifted students", making training in gifted education mandatory for teachers in their training and providing "greater professional learning" to educators to help them differentiate the curriculum for high-achieving students, Mr Scott said.