ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, August 20, 1996 TAG: 9608200020
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG
SOURCE: LISA APPLEGATE STAFF WRITER
An age-old battle has stirred up again in Montgomery County schools, this time with new ammunition.
At issue are students labeled "gifted." They make up about 16 percent of the student population, about the same as special education students. More than half of the gifted students in the county attend Blacksburg-area schools.
County school administrators say the gifted program has grown significantly in the past few years.
Still, some parents of gifted students say their children aren't being challenged by the curriculum. Now parents who believe their children are not achieving their potential say they have the factual data to support them.
R.J. Harvey, a Virginia Tech psychology professor, compared scores in separate tests that measure students' performance and aptitudes. Harvey found that county students with higher ability scores tend to score lower on tests than expected.
Harvey's report didn't surprise Tony Linkous. Last year, he paid tuition to move his daughter, Sydney, from Belview Elementary School to Radford City schools.
"We started noticing in about the second grade that her achievement test scores were not keeping up with what we knew she could do," he said.
Linkous praised teachers at Belview, but said the instructional program wasn't challenging enough for his daughter.
After a year in Radford schools, Linkous said, Sydney's scores have improved and she enjoys learning again.
One week before the new school year begins, school administrators are still trying to hire a replacement for Linda Waggaman, the former gifted program supervisor who resigned to take a supervisory job with Pulaski County schools.
Despite an increase in staff over the past three years, some parents worry that resources for gifted programs are stretched too thin. Like Waggaman, the new supervisor will also oversee the fine arts curriculum in the county.
Under the current program, a gifted coordinator oversees each attendance area: Auburn, Shawsville, Blacksburg and Christiansburg. But those four are also responsible for other areas of curriculum, such as social studies and math.
Elementary schools in the Riner/Bethel, the Shawsville/Elliston and the Prices Fork areas also have gifted resource teachers. They assist classroom teachers in those smaller schools to develop lessons for the few gifted students in each class.
But resource teachers aren't enough for a place like Blacksburg, said parent Theresa Maher, because gifted students are so numerous. She and other parents would like to see more honors-level classes in the middle school, and more students grouped by ability level in middle and elementary schools.
When Maher's oldest son attended Blacksburg Middle School, students were grouped. Now, her younger son's classes include students from all ability levels.
"The change was a social change," she said. "They thought if they put it in a mix of students the behavior problems of lower [ability] kids would improve. And it did, but it hurt the gifted kids.
"The problem in middle school is that the abilities are so broad that it's just too stretched for teachers to handle it all."
Jim Sellers, assistant superintendent for instruction, remembers during his tenure as Blacksburg Middle School principal when students were grouped by ability.
"Children relegated to levels knew their status," he said. "It was not a healthy socialization process for children who were at their most interested, emotional and impressionable time in their lives."
In larger schools like Blacksburg Middle, Sellers said, principals do include five to eight gifted students in classes whenever possible, a number recommended by gifted instruction specialists.
Also, county schools are trying to implement a way to improve communication between parents of gifted students and teachers by sending home information about instructional programs.
Parents of gifted children said they don't want anything special for their children, just a curriculum that's appropriate to their ability.
Several School Board members say they'll review the issue. "There's enough interest on the School Board that we're going to take some steps of see what to do with gifted programming," said Wat Hopkins.
But it's challenging process, particularly in a school system with diverse needs and levels of ability, he said.
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