BrieAnna J Frank

The Republic | azcentral.com

The Higley Unified School District will offer a "highly gifted" preschool program starting July 24

Parents will have to pay for their child to be given an IQ test and receive a score of 130

Some experts do not like early IQ testing on children as they see it as unreliable and stressful

A new preschool with a 20-student class of 4- and 5-year-olds is set to open in the Higley Unified School District for the 2017-2018 school year, but it comes with a catch: You have to be really, really smart.

The admission requirement is an IQ of 130 or higher.

The Higley district is adding the "highly gifted" program to its existing specialized preschool lineup at the Sossaman Early Childhood Development Center in Queen Creek, which includes Spanish and Mandarin dual-language programs.

"Parents are like, 'Oh my gosh, this is exactly what I've been dreaming of for my child,' " said HUSD's Director of Early Childhood Development Centers Patti Gleason.

Potential students are required to take the Stanford Binet IQ test (paid for by parents) and receive a score of 130 (the 99th percentile) or above to be accepted into the program.

If it doesn't seem likely for a 4-year-old to have an IQ that high, guess again.

By the end of January, eight students had already been accepted into the preschool, six months before its July 24 start date.

Need for early identification

Warren Shillingburg, HUSD's assistant superintendent for educational services, said early identification and proper placement of gifted students is important so they feel accepted and validated despite their differences.

"Preschool-age children are egocentric," Shillingburg said. "They think about themselves and think, 'Everyone thinks like I do.' It's hard when gifted students meet other children and they're thinking about math problems and the little kids just want to play in the sand. They don't realize that everyone isn't the same."

Gleason said unlike traditional preschool programs, a project-based model will be used for the highly gifted class that will allow students to work together on projects related to their interests.

Shillingburg said highly gifted preschoolers don't need as much repetition as the general population of preschoolers because they tend to grasp onto new concepts quickly, meaning they can handle the accelerated pace of the program.

Despite the children having intellectual differences, Shillingburg said it's important to remember that at the end of the day, highly gifted preschoolers are still kids.

"If I have a high IQ I'm going to be really bright, but I'm still 4 years old," Shillingburg said. "So you have to remember, socially and emotionally they're still 4-year-olds that we have to help."

Shillingburg and Gleason said the self-contained program will emphasize social development alongside academic rigor.

How giftedness is identified

While testing is used to determine whether a student qualifies as gifted for the specialized preschool, Arizona Association for Gifted and Talented President Donna Campbell said oftentimes, gifted students are identified by their behaviors rather than their test scores.

Campbell said traits such as advanced reasoning skills, language proficiency, broad knowledge base, or an ability to easily learn new subjects could hint that a student is gifted and requires more challenging curriculum — but stressed that it's not always the case.

"Sometimes parents will see and recognize this (potential giftedness) way before children go to school," Campbell said. "But there's always the possibility that without parents seeing their child in a classroom of 25 other children, they're not sure whether what they're seeing is normal. A lot of times we rely on teachers to observe children with their peers."

But not all teachers receive training in identifying gifted students, meaning some might not get the advanced curriculum they need.

"The unique needs of gifted learners have historically not been appropriately addressed by teacher and leader preparation programs across the country," Arizona Department of Education spokesman Stefan Swiat said. "The majority of teachers and principals may not have received any specific training prior to entering the profession."

Controversy over testing young children

Despite the lack of training available for teachers in identifying giftedness, Campbell was hesitant to recommend standardized testing for 4-year-olds. According to AAGT's website, this is somewhat of a controversial issue, with experts conflicted on whether routine early testing is beneficial.

Additionally, the National Association for Gifted Children's website states that "it is difficult to make accurate IQ determinations at an early age (under 6)."

The NAGC provides alternative methods for determining giftedness in young children, including characteristic checklists, parent/teacher surveys and interviews, observations and portfolios.

While there's debate over which method is most appropriate for identifying gifted children at an early age, there's hardly any question that early identification is important.

"Without those skills being developed, students are in danger of becoming bored and not attending to school, or having a negative attitude toward school when they lack opportunity for growth," Campbell said. "It's extremely important to find where our students are so we can move them along that learning journey as quickly and purposefully as possible."

Lack of funding for gifted programs

But moving gifted students along in their journey hasn't been so easy in recent years.

Arizona law (ARS §15-779.01) states: "Because it is in the public interest to support unique opportunities for high-achieving and underachieving pupils who are identified as gifted, the governing board of each school district shall provide gifted education to gifted pupils. ..."

In the past, school districts in compliance with the law could apply for funding from the Department of Education to support gifted education programs in the amount of $75 per pupil for 4 percent of the school district's enrollment, or $2,000, whichever is more.

However, the grant program has gone unfunded since 2009, leaving it up to the districts to decide how much of their budgets they can, and want to, devote to gifted education.

The population most negatively affected by the lack of funding for gifted education? Minority and low-income students, according to Campbell.

"There's what we call an opportunity gap between our predominantly white students and underserved students who are unable to be identified and provided with resources," Campbell said.

Legislative action

But there's a push for all of that to change.

House Bill 2199 and Senate Bill 1105 attempt to reinstate funding for gifted education and prioritize low-income and minority students in dispersing funds.

Both bills call for $3.5 million to be appropriated from the state general fund to the state Department of Education in fiscal year 2017-2018 to help support gifted students across the state.

Rep. Heather Carter, R-Phoenix, said that for the past two years, she's pushed for similar bills to reinstate funding for gifted education, but that they never made it to the budget.

Carter said she's been advocating for reinstating gifted funding since she was elected in 2011, but started to push for bills in the past two years once the economy stabilized.

Carter said she's optimistic because this is the furthest a bill for reinstating gifted funding has gone in the House since she's been elected, adding that there's been a lot of support behind the bill.

"The testimony was compelling," Carter said. "Students and parents shared their story on the unique needs for gifted children to have appropriate high quality education. It's more than just giving them more work."

If the bills get passed, Swiat said a good place to start would be ensuring that teachers receive proper training in identifying gifted students.

"More intentional training for teachers and leaders as part of their initial preparation programs is needed, as well as additional follow-up professional learning opportunities through their schools and districts, so we can help ensure they can effectively meet the needs of their gifted learners," Swiat said.

Positive response from parents

Shillingburg and Gleason said the response from parents about the preschool has been overwhelmingly positive, especially considering the statewide lack of resources and programs available for gifted students.

Despite its location in the far East Valley, Campbell said some parents of gifted children would likely be willing to travel whatever distance it took to have their child participate in a program suited to their academic needs.

"This inconsistency (lack of gifted programs) has really been difficult on the gifted community," Campbell said. "Parents are searching all over trying to find the right placement for their gifted student."

Campbell said she knows of one mother who drove 40 miles twice a day to take her child to a school with a gifted program, adding that a program like HUSD's highly gifted preschool is "very rare."

Shillingburg said participation in the program isn't limited to those who live within the Higley district boundaries, and that anyone willing to travel to the center is encouraged to apply.

Tuition for the program is $575 per month, with preschool from 7:45 a.m. to 2:45 p.m.

Moving forward from preschool

Plans are for the preschool students to be part of an advanced kindergarten class at Bridges Elementary School in HUSD, according to minutes from a Jan. 11 HUSD governing board meeting.

According to the HUSD website, gifted students at the elementary level are clustered together in regular classrooms and a gifted specialist assists the teacher in providing "appropriately challenging curriculum."

Shillingburg said HUSD middle schools offer acceleration programs, which then lead advanced students to HUSD's high school options, including a "rigorous" and "highly rigorous" track that culminate in a capstone project prior to graduation.

Shillingburg and Gleason said they're confident that offering a one-of-a-kind program that caters to the oftentimes overlooked population of gifted students will reap benefits for students and parents, as well as the district, which hopes to serve students throughout their educational career.

"It's just a great place for children to be," Shillingburg said. "People will want to come to Higley through senior year in high school."