National Summit to Focus on Strategies to Serve High-Ability Learners from Low-Income Backgrounds
Thursday, June 7, 2012
By: Nicholas Manetto

NAGC Meeting to Identify Gaps in Research & Practice

WASHINGTON (May 29, 2012) The National Association for Gifted Children, the nation's leading advocate for high-ability and high-potential students, is convening a meeting of experts to identify key research gaps and the corresponding challenges in serving these students who come from low-income backgrounds.

The summit, supported by a grant from the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation, will explore the impact of poverty on students, best practices in identifying and serving high-ability students from low-income settings and the policies needed to build a systemic approach to talent development. It will be held May 30th to the 31st at 1575 Eye Street NW, Washington, DC.

"It is abundantly clear that the United States is failing to adequately develop our talent. This failure is costing us dearly, particularly in our ability to solve pressing national challenges and to compete effectively academically and economically against other nations. High-ability and high-potential learners from low-income settings bear the brunt of this neglect, and the nation must respond with effective solutions," said NAGC President Paula Olszweski-Kubilius, professor of education at Northwestern University.

Little to no funding to support high-ability learners in disadvantaged communities, a paucity of supplemental programs, few teachers adequately trained to work with high-ability students and a widening achievement gap between high-ability learners from low-income backgrounds and their more affluent peers are examples of the many challenges the summit will seek to address.

At the federal policy level, Congress's elimination of funding for the Jacob Javits research program, which focused specifically on developing strategies to help teachers identify and serve high-ability learners from disadvantaged settings, has been a hurdle, as has the near-singular focus on raising the performance of low-performing students while disregarding the learning needs of those at the higher end of the achievement spectrum.

"The summit will identify the fundamental challenges and the research needed to overcome them. Doing so will move us closer to developing a national talent development strategy to help regain our position as the world's innovator," Olszweski-Kubilius said.

Media interested in attending the summit should contact Nick Manetto at 202.312.7499 or at nick.manetto@faegrebd.com.