Equity in Gifted Education at International Schools

Around the world, gifted education has long been hampered by charges of elitism, but recent shifts in international school education reveal that when it comes to meeting the needs of highly able and advanced learners, the real issue is ensuring equity. Many international schools have been on a journey towards inclusion and embracing inclusive practices with a focus on equity. Yet, one group of students has consistently been, albeit unintentionally, largely excluded from these efforts—gifted and highly able learners.

In 2016, a survey of 8,000 international schools found that while 84 percent of respondents reported enrolling gifted and talented students, only 35 percent were satisfied with their service provisions. The late Bill Powell, former Director of Next Frontier Inclusion (NFI) and collaborator on the ISC Research study, noted,

“There is a disconnect here. Many times, school leaders use finances as a reason to exclude children with special educational needs. They’ll say: ‘we don’t have the programme for you, so it would be wrong for us to take you into our school’. But on the flip side of this, some of these schools are accepting children with high academic gifts and talents, even though they admit they are not happy with the provision they provide. That’s a significant ethical consideration that this survey has highlighted.”                                       -BESA, 2016, para. 7

In pre-pandemic 2019, ISC Research collaborated once again with NFI to conduct an updated global survey, the results of which revealed that while 74 percent of international school respondents report accepting highly capable students, only 29.27 percent report satisfaction with their provision for gifted and talented students (ISC Research, 2020). The continued stark discrepancy demands attention, and the need to reevaluate policies, procedures, and approaches for advanced learners has never been clearer.

In some ways, this mismatch is understandable. International schools are typically well-resourced, staffed with highly qualified educators, recognized by rigorous curricular offerings, and enriched by multicultural communities. They seem, (and quite literally are), a world away from some of the classrooms described in the research literature on gifted education that has emerged from the United States of America or other large national school systems. It is tempting to believe that such culturally rich environments must surely satisfy the needs of the brightest learner. However, simply offering a rigorous curriculum in a richly diverse environment does not equate to meeting the specific needs of learners who require something qualitatively different from their same-age peers (Gierczyk & Hornby, 2021). And when we fail to recognize or appropriately address this fact/truism/reality, we cannot claim to serve students equitably.

Educators widely recognize the benefits of a growth mindset (Dweck, 2012) and grit (Duckworth, 2016), yet these attributes cannot develop without adequate challenge. For highly able learners, routine success with minimal effort prohibits opportunities to develop these qualities and can lead to stalled intellectual growth and diminished resilience. In assessing the learning outcomes for these students, schools must prioritize growth over mere achievement, asking not “How well did they achieve?” but rather, “How did they grow?” A year’s worth of growth for a year’s worth of school should be the expectation for all learners, including the highly able. To achieve this, intentionality and commitment are required at all levels of a school’s structure, from policies to classroom practices.

Gifted education has undeniably suffered from an image problem in the past. The human capital argument—the notion that gifted students will contribute significantly to society, potentially curing diseases or solving global crises—has understandably alienated many (Lipovská & Fischer, 2016). While some children may indeed go on to make major contributions in science, business, or the arts, the justification for supporting and providing services for these learners should rest not on their potential future contributions to society, but on their right to be supported in being personally fulfilled, thriving, global citizens. Just as other areas of education have, the field of gifted education has evolved significantly over the years, moving away from traditional IQ and achievement-based models toward a talent development perspective that is more flexible, inclusive, and suited to diverse contexts. With 6.7 million children enrolled worldwide in international schools as of July 2023, this shift is particularly relevant for the linguistic, ethnic, and neurodiverse contexts of international schools (Hingston, 2023).

This perspective, influenced by Benjamin Bloom’s work (1985) on talent development involving accomplished artists, scientists, and athletes, emphasizes the concept that giftedness is not fixed but rather grows and develops through appropriate support, opportunity, and effort (Olszewski-Kubilius, 2012; Reynen-Woodward et al., 2023). As such, talent development offers international schools an inclusive way to think about and work with students of high ability. Students with exceptional abilities may require different timeframes and multiple pathways to fully translate their gifts into exceptional and demonstrable achievement.

In the talent development model, high ability is entirely context-specific, focusing on the potential gap between a student’s current readiness and the level of instruction provided. Similar to a learning support framework tailored to students’ specific needs, talent development programs for highly able learners should respond dynamically, adjusting the intervention response to meet evolving skills and interests. International schools, with their relative curricular flexibility, are well positioned to explore and implement truly innovative strategies that foster student growth.

It is important to acknowledge that despite the strengths of an inclusive and responsive talent development model, the introduction of policies and procedures to meet the needs of highly able learners may be hampered by misconceptions, biases, and resistance from organizational stakeholders. Schools must approach these obstacles from a position of equity, building defensible, research-based practices that can alleviate political tensions. School leaders should be guided by their individual school contexts and develop policies and equitable opportunities that are grounded in the school’s existing mission and vision. Leadership in this area also requires ongoing, specialized professional development that reflects the unique challenges of the international school landscape and supports inclusive efforts for all students, including the highly able. International schools, with their diverse student populations and global perspectives, are uniquely positioned to embrace the holistic view of inclusive education (Brittingham Furlonge et al., 2023) that talent development espouses. This forward-thinking perspective, grounded in research and an evolving understanding of giftedness, challenges the outdated perceptions of gifted education and sets a new standard for meeting the needs of all learners.

References

BESA. (2016, April 21). Member News - ISC Research: Results of research into inclusion in international schools. BESA. https://www.besa.org.uk/news/member-news-isc-research-results-research-inclusion-international-schools/

Bloom, B. (1985). Developing talent in young people. New York, NY: Ballantine.

Duckworth, A. (2016). Grit: The power of passion and perseverance. New York: Simon and Schuster.

Dweck, C. (2012). Mindset: How you can fulfil your potential. London: Constable and Robinson.

Gierczyk, M., & Hornby, G. (2021). Twice-Exceptional students: Review of implications for special and inclusive education. Education Sciences, 11(2), 85. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci11020085