"Gifted" Education

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What are your opinions or "Gifted Education"? Do you think it has any correlation to ASD? Have you been in/ Are you in any "Gifted Education" courses? How do you feel about it overall? Sound off below!
I am not a "gifted child", so to speak. However, I do have concerns about what effects it may have on the school system and other peers.

When I was in public school (which was up until about three weeks ago, from grades 1-10), I was in the "Gifted" programme. It was nothing more than just honours classes. I test high enough to be considered gifted on formal IQ tests. I thought it was all so stupid, to have the gifted programme. My school was extremely diverse, both racially and socioeconomically, and one could definitely see that there was a correlation between the your socioeconomic stoats (and race, though this was not as strong a correlation) and one's placement in the school's various programmes. Those students who got help at home, could afford tutors, were intellectually stimulated as young children, all got identified gifted. Those who did not have the resources were not identified gifted, regardless of intelligence level.

About ASD: I believe, along with several psychs, teachers, family, and friends, that I am on the spectrum. My pediatrician had suggested autism before I turned three, although I had a strong vocabulary and proper use of grammar. My mother did not agree, claiming that my "issues" stem from intellectual giftedness, and that I am smart enough to be "fixed". After several psychs suggesting autism testing (two as recently as last year), she found a psych that would tell her what she wanted to hear. "Your daughter is gifted! She's not autistic, just gifted!" and this doctor, mid you, does not believe in asperger's syndrome. I believe that my intellectual abilities come from the different way my brain works, because of whatever differences the AS causes, or maybe not, but there is more going on hat just "giftedness".

I tested into the 'gifted' category but because I had ASD and ADHD they put me in special ed instead. With students that had dyslexia and ODD and I missed out on lots of field trips...

We had TAG (talented and gifted) and general classes.

I did TAG classes. They were a bit more advanced and a little faster than the general classes. They also had MUCH LESS ignorant behavior during class.

We also had AP classes. Many non-college seeking students took AP, not to get college credit, but to get out of the general population classes. One year the school decided to force everyone taking AP to take the AP test. The school's average rock bottomed that year because people just slept through the test.

I think gifted education is one of the most neglected areas of the American educational system. We spend millions of dollars to help special ed students get up to the baseline, but if you look at studies of high school drop outs, many of them are dropping out because it's boring. I don't have a problem with spending money on special education; but we aren't investing anywhere near enough money and resources into our gifted children. In fact, some places are even doing away with gifted programs because it isn't inclusive of the whole student population. That's ridiculous. Why are we holding back our best and brightest? That's not a smart policy on any level.

Not everyone can be good at everything. I learned along time ago, I'm never going to be an honor roll, all star mathematician, but I had friends who were. I was happy for them, I didn't complain because I couldn't make honor roll in math. I didn't complain because I was left out of the advanced math class. I had things I was good at that they weren't.

I would love to see for every dollar spent on special education, a matching dollar was spent on gifted education. Encourage and challenge these students like never before. They will be the inventors and leaders of the future. For all we know, someone destined to cure cancer dropped out of school because either they didn't have a gifted program or it was a joke and he/she was just bored in regular class.

I think community college also needs to be done away with. I finished high school because it was quite honestly like going to Disneyland compared to my home situation at the time, but after I left and could study on my own and live with nice people who did not restrict me for no reason, I got bored and left, even though I can't go to a good college unless I go back. But I cannot do well because they force me to attend lectures and I am brain deaf when it comes to lectures...

Community college is an invaluable resource for people who want to learn trades or get a head start on college.

4 year colleges force you to attend lectures as well.

I am in the GAT (Gifted, Able and Talented) group, but 'gifted education' at my school doesn't really do much apart from run the debating society and organise the occasional field trip. I made some good friends at debating club, though, and there is a girl there who also has high-functioning autism.
I am probably one of the only pupils at my school on both the GAT and SEN registers.

I'm not sure if I'm "gifted" or not. Not sure where to test, but I'll test it this fall in college! Gotta get that degree to go somewhere... ><
I was verbally bullied a lot in elementary and middle school, so when I would get into mischief at school, I just looked like an insecure kid.

I think "gifted" education should be separated. Whenever I mention to an NT about something really "advanced," like robotics, they look at me like I'm an idiot. Even my parents look at me funny whenever I mention a subject that's just "out-there." Due to this, sometimes its really hard to share one's aspirations, careers goals, and dreams to even the simplest of people.

meh, gifted education didn't meet my needs as a student anymore than general education did. it felt like a poorly funded warehouse where children with specific designations (based on narrow definitions of intellect - and demonstrable talent, rather than latent talent) milled about aimlessly three hours a week. there was never any structured enrichment; it was just a space to fraternize and chat - things that were always major issues for me. retrospectively, i wish i'd been placed in interest groups or clubs (mathematics, art, science, robotics) and forgone the gifted experience altogether. it feels like a meaningless academic pedigree, to me now. i can say: "yes, i was a gifted student"; but because my school put no real effort into the program - and because the program wasn't built for autistic learners - i feel like i got nothing much from it, in truth.

one problem i see with gifted education is that people confuse the heterogeneity of "giftedness" with a more statistically infrequent "classic giftedness" (a relatively small subset of the whole). giftedness, like autism, covers a wide range of skill-sets and manifestations and not everyone is polymath with a balanced distribution of strengths. many gifted students are twice exceptional (or their development is asynchronous enough that they require the same patience and support). there are gifted students who receive poor grades, who fail out of school (contrary to popular assumption). i feel like being identified as gifted can do the student a disservice if educators and parents are too quick to focus on said giftedness - decontextualized from the person and their specific, complex needs. for me, it created an expectation that i should conform the norms of a label, despite myself, despite my entirety - despite whatever else i may have required, in order to be truly successful.

I considered them "snob classes."

Yeah, they were probably smarter, but you got in on the basis of grades alone. I had a genius IQ and was in the "ret*d" class because my grades weren't good. My grades were poor due to the hostile learning environment and that the classes bored me.

My school didn't have a proper gifted programme, so I had to spend my whole time at school daydreaming and became suicidally bored. I was statemented and a ridiculous amount of money was spent on completely ineffective "autism support" despite my complaints, yet they refused to let me grade skip due to ignorant educational policy even though that would have actually saved them money and would have solved most of the problems that I had in school.

Being gifted and being on the spectrum are two different things. I am gifted (everybody on my dad's side of the family is gifted, like genius-level IQ. They are all NT). I am also autistic. (I get the autism from my mom who is also autistic. She is not gifted.) I had a good friend in high school who was very smart, probably even a genius. He was not autistic, so he did not have all the problems I had socially and emotionally and practically. He is successful and "normal". I am still living with my mom and unemployed, basically a 30 year old child socially.

One thing I have noticed about gifted people is that they are lonely just like aspies are because they think differently than most other people. It is like they are older intellectually than their peers. They understand things their peers don't understand yet, so they don't fit in. That is how a lot of my cousins are but they are definitely not aspies. I think anyone with an IQ above 120 is going to have some social impairment because of it. They probably need to be grouped together in the "gifted" classes because they won't fit in with "normal" people. Being in the "gifted" classes gives them people to hang out with. That is how it was when I was in school. I was with all the preps in the cafeteria. We understood each other. I caught hell from everybody else though, had to pretend to be something I am not in order to have friends who weren't in the gifted classes.

I think for me being gifted was a set up for disappointment without also having the diagnosis for AS. I thought I was going to grow up to be a senator or the president or something. My assets have always been overshadowed by my mental health problems. My whole 20's I busted my ass trying to function normally and never could make the cut. Getting diagnosed as being on the spectrum gave me a reason why I couldn't succeed even though I was gifted. I think my life path would have been a bit more realistic if I knew about AS when I was a teenager.

Such is life. In my parents' generation, there was no help because there was no diagnosis. Better late than never for me.