Teaching High Achieveing Students through an Equity Lens: Home

In current research and theoretical models that address racial inequity or gender disparities in gifted education, there is a missing narrative around high-achieving/gifted Black girls and their experiences, as well as their disproportionate underrepresentation in gifted programming, services, and Advanced Placement (AP) courses. This article highlights literature on adolescent gifted Black girls, in addition to exploring barriers and issues of marginalization that constrain the talent identification and development of this population. The study explores the narratives of gifted Black women and explores their counternarratives using Critical Race Theory and Frasier's Talent Assessment Profile (F-TAP) framework. The article urges educators to use an intersectional lens to understand and address the needs of adolescent gifted Black girls, and provides practical tools to identify and develop talent.

Perfectionism is commonly associated with gifted females, yet little research examines perfectionism across racial groups. Although gifted Black girls’ perfectionistic tendencies mirror other females, they experience perfectionism uniquely at the intersection of race and gender. Perfectionism can contribute to gifted Black girls’ desire to exceed academic expectations and guidelines, but emotional distress can arise when compounded by stereotype threat. This article will highlight ways perfectionism can be psychologically distressing to gifted Black females in the K-12 setting, and how perfectionism and stereotype threat affect achievement, emotional well-being, and motivation of gifted Black girls. Finally, this article concludes with promising practices for educators in the K-12 setting who work with gifted Black girls.

The purpose of this article is to explore many of the experiences that Black Americans have in science education in the United States and propose changes so that Black Americans have an equitable opportunity to engage in and learn quality science. The outcome of quality science is the possession of science knowledge and skills of Black American students to either maintain or change their world as they choose. Science for All Americans delineates the themes and habits of minds that scientifically literate high school graduates should possess; however, these are the preparatory fundamentals for Black American students if equity is to exist for them in science education. Equity in science learning, science teaching, science schooling practices, and quality science opportunities are discussed. The science learning of Black American students continue to be championed; however, the debate persists on the efficiency of culturally relevant science learning. The instruction of many impoverished rural and urban Black American students is very inadequate because of low teacher expectation, inadequate science knowledge and skills of teachers, teachers' poorly clarified professional and cultural beliefs and values, and science curricula that do not focus on the knowledge and skills outlined in Science for All Americans. Some progress toward schooling practices has occurred; however, few have been implemented long enough to determine their impact on Black Americans' science learning. Proposed solutions aimed at providing equitable opportunities for all students to learn quality science include preparing multicultural science teachers, eliminating tracking in schools, equipping classes with science curriculum materials and technology, and supplying financial resources.

This chapter discusses rigor through an examination of academic experiences that promote college outcomes for all students, particularly for those from marginalized backgrounds or with lower academic preparation.

Considering the benefits that accrue in countries having low levels of social inequality and the harm that accompanies wide disparities in income, it is important to examine any practices or traditions that contribute to inequality. Under some circumstances, gifted education does confer advantages that are not available to all students, particularly when its identification procedures fail to recognize potential in students not in the dominant group or when services improve the educational opportunities only for those who are identified even though all students could benefit. The elimination of age grading, a practice that inhibits the development of potential for many children, including gifted children, is recommended as a solution to the inequality engendered by current practice.

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For decades, our educational system has been criticized for the limited recruitment and retention of minority students in gifted education programs. Unfortunately, relatively little progress has been made to alleviate these concerns. An examination of the literature on gifted education for underrepresented students reveals a dearth of information regarding effective programming practices. This article seeks to fill this void by exploring promising best practices for recruitment and retention of underrepresented students in gifted education. Multicultural education, mentoring, and noncognitive skill development are three promising areas that gifted educators can use to enhance programming.

This Bill of Rights for Gifted Students of Color was envisioned with the singular goal of effecting change based on equity and cultural responsiveness. The eight sections focus on fundamental issues representing removing barriers. Gifted students of color must have their gifts and talents recognized, affirmed, and developed as districts endeavor to recruit and retain them in gifted education.

In most books that provide an overview of or introduction to gifted education, attention is devoted to characteristics of gifted education teachers. The authors of these various works contend that such teachers require specific skills and knowledge in order to facilitate the academic, cognitive, and affective development of gifted students. Because many of these characteristics and competencies are described in this special issue of Roeper Review, they ale not repeated in this article. Instead, descriptions of these characteristics and competencies are complemented by addressing additional, often overlooked, characteristics and competencies needed by teachers to work effectively with gifted students, particularly those who are linguistically, culturally and ethnically diverse[1]. These characteristics and competencies focus specifically on multicultural knowledge, philosophies, and skills. Unfortunately, we have found that the lists presented in gifted education books seldom address the need for teachers to have multicultural skills and competencies. A few exceptions appear in Seeley (1979), Hultgren and Seeley (1982), and Bishop (1968). They recommend that teachers have "cultural and intellectual interests" and "skills in working with culturally different talented youth." While this is a beginning, more attention must be devoted to preparing teachers to work with gifted students in general, but particularly those who are culturally, ethnically and linguistically diverse.

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This paper is centered on creating equitable opportunities for learners in mathematics education. Through observations of teacher practice, the paper seeks to theorize how teachers enact their dispositions toward mathematics instruction. These observed propensities, in relation to teachers’ aims for students to “take up their space” in and beyond the mathematics classroom, then inform a model of equitable mathematics instruction. Teachers’ dispositions are considered in relation to Mason’s discipline of noticing and Bourdieu’s notion of the symbolic violence of dominant discourses.

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In the United States, poor and minority students are disproportionately excluded from programs for the gifted. Current identification practices for gifted education programs are a primary barrier for these youngsters. This study investigated three alternative assessments for identifying students. Each was said to draw on the theory of multiple intelligences (Gardner, 1983) and to increase the identification of traditionally under‐served youngsters. This investigation asked: (1) Is it reasonable to associate increases in the identification of under‐served youngsters with these assessments? (2) Is it reasonable to associate each assessment with the theory of multiple intelligences? To answer these questions, qualitative data were analyzed against a framework of eight criteria. This revealed that no assessment met all eight criteria; each met a different subset of the eight.

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The school-age population in North America is characterized by increasing linguistic, cultural, and ethnic diversity. The authors argue that non-mainstream students do not perform as well in schools as mainstream students (predominantly whilte, middle-class English speakers) because they are not equitably served by the educational system. They explore some of the complexities of educational equity and consider equity issues in the literacy education of language minority students from four different perspectives: individual student characteristics, sociocultural factors, language issues, and instructional issues. In support of their position, they examine each of these areas in turn, providing illustrations and analysis. They conclude with several principles upon which to build practices to make literacy education more equitable for all students.

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Equity is an important element of educational discourses pertaining to mathematics and science education. Creativity is an aspect of the classroom that is often ignored due to curricular constraints and the burden of testing. However mathematics offers avenues to infuse the regular curricula with activities that are thought provoking and require creativity and these are accessible to learners of all levels. This article reviews creativity strategies that can be embedded in mathematics curricula to increase classroom equity. These strategies will include the strength of presenting open-ended problems, modeling and encouraging risk taking, discussions and debate of mathematical concepts, concept based learning, divergent thinking strategies during problem solving activities, and incorporating cultural awareness and creativity into curricula and classroom environment. The article will focus both on teacher implementation of these strategies and student outcomes regarding creativity and equity.

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Critical race theory (CRT) in education has been used to expose and analyze racism in K-12 schooling and higher education. However, the theory has been underutilized as an inventory lens applied to school leadership practice. Our paper takes on this inquiry by highlighting the work done by an administrative leadership team at a majority racially diverse middle school in the Mountain western region of the U.S. Through an examination of the practice of racism as whiteness as property through teacher expectations, classroom instruction and teacher-student and parent interactions and by implementing changes in areas of student discipline, and color-blind teacher perceptions, the leadership team developed racial equity pathways which served as an important implementation of CRT leadership.

Today's gifted students are in a unique position. Many come from traditionally advantaged backgrounds. However, the societal tide is shifting, and gifted learners should be at the forefront of change. Exposure to and comprehensive analysis of literature by diverse authors will help prepare students for the world they stand to inherit and will open their minds to the faulty systems that work to their advantage. As gifted students gain an appreciation of global context and the impact of colonial influence and oppression, they will be better positioned to demand change and equity. Participating in a culturally responsive classroom environment is one way to facilitate this awareness. This article includes specific examples of both the challenges and strategies to address issues surrounding diversity in the gifted classroom through inclusive literature instruction.

Racial and ethnic disproportionality in gifted education is a persistent and perennial inequity in many school districts. This report describes the root causes of this disproportionality and discusses ways in which this issue can be addressed. Whereas most of the attention has been paid to assessment, specifically the use of nonverbal tests to identify gifted students, this report argues that implementing talent development measures is key to increasing the numbers of racially and/or linguistically diverse students in gifted education. Because socioeconomic status has a substantial effect on a child's linguistic and intellectual development, talent development strategies that shore up academic deficiencies from a young age hold promise over strategies that merely aim to provide a nonbiased assessment of ability. To give the reader a purview of the different talent development measures, several successful programs are described. The report concludes with a list of recommendations for district leadership. U-STARS-PLUS is appended.

This essay conceptualizes an equity-oriented pedagogy that instructors in higher
education in America can use to address barriers to equity, access, and inclusion within
their classrooms. We formulate this pedagogy by drawing upon existing scholarship that
explores democratic, multimodal, assessment-driven, and game-based instructional
strategies. We synthesize promising features of these instructional strategies to
contribute a new and adaptive approach to pedagogy that is informed by studentlearning data. Furthermore, we place this pedagogy under scrutiny and explain why it
would be beneficial to evaluate it in various classroom settings.

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A sense of belonging means feeling accepted, appreciated, and understood in our relationships with individuals and groups of people. However, students who have abilities and qualities that are exceptionally advanced and qualitatively different from their same age peers may experience a sense of alienation. Gifted students are seeking intellectual, social, and emotional connectedness. This study explores the perspectives of gifted students, their parents, and teachers in relation to developing belonging through opportunities to engage with like-minded peers. The gifted students in this study were seeking relationships with others who thought in similar ways to themselves, as intellectual peers and friends both in and outside school. The study concludes that, for the gifted students in this study, their engagement with like-minded peers afforded opportunities for belonging and connectedness. Having a sense of school belonging removes a potential barrier to achievement for gifted learners, and this, it is argued, is a matter of equity.

This literature review focuses on the definitions and roles of inclusion in the field of mathematics education to help promote the sustainable development of inclusion in the discipline. Discourse analysis was used to analyse 76 studies published between 2010 and 2016. The results show that the term inclusion is used both for an ideology and a way of teaching, and these two uses are most often treated separately and independently of each other. When inclusion is treated as an ideology, values are articulated; when treated as a way of teaching, interventions are brought to the fore. When the notion of inclusion is used as an ideology, the most extensive discourse concerns equity in mathematics education; when it is used as a way of teaching, the most extensive discourse relates to teaching interventions for mathematical engagement. Based on the literature review, if sustainable development of inclusion in mathematics education is to be promoted, scholars need to connect and interrelate the operationalisation and meanings of inclusion in both society and in mathematics classrooms, and take students' voices into consideration in research.

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The nature of life in the 21st century suggests that schools must prepare students to be thinkers, problemsolvers, collaborators, wise consumers of information, and confident producers of knowledge. The nature of 21st century student populations suggests that schools will have to become more responsive to the broadening array of cultures, languages, experiences, economics, and interests represented in most contemporary classrooms—and to do so in ways that provide equity of access to robust learning experiences for that broad spectrum of learners. Such classrooms will be heterogeneous in nature, and learner-centered, knowledge-centered, assessment-centered, instruction-centered, and community-centered. Teachers in those classrooms will need to be proficient in “teaching up,” or planning learning experiences at a high level of challenge while providing scaffolding to support many learners in succeeding with those experiences and extending the challenge in a meaningful way for advanced learners.

We conducted a laboratory‐based randomized control study to examine the effectiveness of inquiry‐based instruction. We also disaggregated the data by student demographic variables to examine if inquiry can provide equitable opportunities to learn. Fifty‐eight students aged 14–16 years old were randomly assigned to one of two groups. Both groups of students were taught toward the same learning goals by the same teacher, with one group being taught from inquiry‐based materials organized around the BSCS 5E Instructional Model, and the other from materials organized around commonplace teaching strategies as defined by national teacher survey data. Students in the inquiry‐based group reached significantly higher levels of achievement than students experiencing commonplace instruction. This effect was consistent across a range of learning goals (knowledge, reasoning, and argumentation) and time frames (immediately following the instruction and 4 weeks later). The commonplace science instruction resulted in a detectable achievement gap by race, whereas the inquiry‐based materials instruction did not. We discuss the implications of these findings for the body of evidence on the effectiveness of teaching science as inquiry; the role of instructional models and curriculum materials in science teaching; addressing achievement gaps; and the competing demands of reform and accountability.

Lack of access to gifted education is prevalent, yet preventable for Black and Hispanic students. Years of data from the Office for Civil Rights and national reports reveal that deficit thinking, prejudice, and discrimination must be at work, thus compromising the educational experiences of gifted students of color. In this article, the authors share data on under-representation in the U.S., along with contributing factors and recommendations. They rail against both ignorance and indifference explanations, calling instead for accountability and deliberate efforts to desegregate gifted education with both excellence and equity as the driving force. We define equity as being fair, responsive, and impartial, especially for those who have the fewest resources and least advocacy, and who have experienced structural inequality due to historical exclusion. We hope readers will learn from the U.S. context and use that which is relevant for their nation's context.

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This study operationalizes warm demander pedagogy as a component of culturally responsive teaching. These instructional methods emerged during a study that examined the pedagogy of two African American urban teachers as compared to the literature. Through observations and interviews, the study examined the following: (a) How did each teacher describe her instructional practices and beliefs? (b) What similarities and differences existed between the teachers' practices and beliefs? (c) Was there evidence that the shared cultural/ethnic background of teachers and students influenced instructional practices? The study proposes warm demander and culturally responsive pedagogy to support a culture of achievement for students of color.

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Despite decades of education reform, the US school curricula remain virtually unchanged. Multi-billion dollar initiatives such as No Child Left Behind, Common Core State Standards, Race to the Top, and Every Student Succeeds Act have not resulted in significant academic gains or curricula change. The exclusion of diversity and multiculturalism in US classrooms and textbooks underserves all students and inaccurately perpetuates a hegemonic narrative. This omission particularly disserves minority students, whose only exposure to Black history is slavery and the Civil Rights Movement. Thus, this qualitative case study examines a high-performing school, Harriet Tubman Academy (pseudonym) – HTA, that utilizes critical multiculturalism and anti-racism education. The findings reveal greater academic achievement, and the students explain that they had a greater understanding and appreciation for multicultural education because of their experiences at HTA. The findings of the study have great implications for urban school reform.

Gifted girls of color represent a potentially untapped resource for increasing and sustaining a diverse science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) workforce. Girls of color possess unique mathematics and science gifts and talents that can remain unrealized if not addressed before middle school. Culturally responsive STEM out-of-school-time (OST) activities can be an effective means to develop STEM capacity in gifted girls of color. The researchers present three considerations to support the implementation of STEM OST. First, they offer a rationale for culturally relevant STEM enrichment activities for gifted girls of color. Next, the researchers consider how culturally relevant STEM OST activities can help to close the achievement gap. Finally, they explain how professional mentorship opportunities within OST activities can help gifted girls of color navigate the STEM pipeline.