Submission to the Senate Employment, Workplace Relations, 
Small Business and Education References Committee 
Inquiry into the Education of Gifted and Talented Children

Concerning ‘(b) consideration of whether current policies and programs for gifted and talented children are suitable and sufficient to meet their special educational needs’:

•	Because provision for the gifted and talented is left to the discretion of individual schools, there is considerable variation in access, both within states and across states. Education of the gifted and talented generally receives a low priority in schools, partly because of ill-informed assumptions that gifted children (a) constitute a very low percentage of the school population and (b) will succeed without much teacher assistance. 

Exceptions to this exist, notably in schools that are partly or fully selective in intake (especially in NSW), in some private schools who see value in attracting gifted students, and in schools where teachers educated about the particular needs of the gifted are providing leadership. 

In schools where the staff espouse the cause of gifted education because of its perceived value as a competitive marketing strategy, but where teaching expertise in this domain is lacking or very limited, provision often seems to be token, superficial and uncoordinated, rather than embedded in everyday classroom practice. Given the paltry amounts of funding directed to the systematic professional development of teachers, this is best seen as a systems failure, not something that should be blamed on the teachers as individuals. 

Principals' attitudes toward and knowledge of the gifted seem to be important determinants of the extent (if any) and nature of identification and provision within Australian schools. 

•	Teacher nomination alone cannot be expected to provide a fair and accurate means of identifying gifted and talented children. Those likely to be overlooked by such subjective identification measures are the nonconformists and the culturally different. 

Teachers need to be educated in the use (where appropriate) and the interpretation (where other specialists are needed to administer the tests) of objective measures of learning potential. Information about best practice in identification (and provision) should be available from designated centres of expertise, such as GERRIC at UNSW.

Given the promising research on its use currently being conducted by a doctoral student at the University of New England, dynamic assessment should be explored as an alternative, or complement, to traditional standardised ability tests, especially for the identification of underachievers with high potential. (The UNE research referred to concerns the identification of high academic potential in Indigenous children.) 

•	Rural isolation can be a negative factor in the education of many children in non-metropolitan Australia, but is particularly so for gifted children who need access to like-minded peers (or adults) to reassure them that their differences are not something to hide or regret, as well as to provide the intellectual or creative stimulation necessary if they are to develop fully their potential. Computer technology offers an opportunity to diminish this social and intellectual isolation, eg through online mentoring programs, such as the Anaiwan project that was trialed in recent years in the Armidale district.  

The Virtual School for the Gifted (VSG), based in Melbourne, provides an important service that helps to alleviate gifted children’s sense of isolation, but its courses are quite expensive, especially for those from less affluent backgrounds, so a greater number of lower cost alternative forms of online provision should be developed, probably in partnership with universities and/or state associations for the gifted and talented. UNE experimented successfully (over a two-and-a-half year period) with online course provision — known as the TalentEd Virtual Enrichment Program (TEdVEP) — but has currently ceased to do so, because of time and workload constraints.

•	The specialist centre at the University of New South Wales (GERRIC) has become a highly productive and wide-reaching means of support for schools, parents and gifted children themselves. Its existing expertise is such that it should be formally declared to be the national centre of excellence for the gifted domain.

	There may be value in also nominating a rural university as a specialist centre in gifted education for disadvantaged and rurally isolated children, perhaps in association with UNSW. UNE has the expertise to fill that role, though there may be other equally suitable institutions. A centre based on the collaboration of two or more rural universities could be considered, especially if this meant that other states than NSW were involved. It would be desirable to build broadly representative teacher, parent and community participation into the management structure of such a centre, as a 'reality check' on its activities. Independent evaluation of its outcomes, by those with appropriate expertise in the gifted field, would also seem wise.

•	Partial acceleration — eg in a single subject, or two, while otherwise remaining with age peers — should be made widely available to gifted children. Online provision will enable this to be more widely accessible, so both secondary schools and universities should be actively encouraged to provide such access to the gifted. Commonwealth funding will facilitate this. Access to online tertiary courses, at minimal cost for those who are economically disadvantaged, should be vigorously promoted as a means of achieving equity for gifted children who live at inconvenient distances from universities.

	A small survey I conducted, in 1998, on behalf of the NSW Association for Gifted and Talented Children suggested that the excellent policy on acceleration developed by the NSW Board of Studies was not widely known by parents of gifted children, nor always followed by schools considering or implementing acceleration. The need for mandatory policies is highlighted by this and other, anecdotal, examples I have encountered of a credibility gap between policy and practice.

Concerning ‘(c) consideration of what the proper role of the Commonwealth should be in supporting the education of gifted and talented children’:

•	Commonwealth funding is needed to promote change and to support the dissemination of best practice ideas. However, it should be specifically targeted at projects that are well researched/evaluated (eg by ‘outsiders’ and sceptics, as well as by those directly involved) and that are likely to produce enduring and widespread improvement. This probably means more than single-year projects.

	Funding a longitudinal national project on the identification of gifted children from disadvantaged and culturally different backgrounds would be a powerful way of making the point that gifted children are to be found in all sectors of our society and that gifted education is not merely a self-interested plea from its more affluent and better educated members.

	Identification alone is not enough but it is a crucial starting point if equity is to be achieved and it should provide an impetus to addressing the next issue, of what forms of provision will engage underachieving gifted children to fulfil their high potential. 

•	Commonwealth funding, in partnership with universities or a national centre  (and perhaps a third party), could be directed into the establishment of an online set of teacher and parent education/information modules on key aspects of giftedness and its development in the Australian context. Access to these could be provided free of charge, as a community service.

•	A national policy statement, covering definition, identification and provision, needs to be developed, in conjunction with the AAEGT and state associations for the gifted and talented, and with the various school systems. 

What we can learn from the past is that unless action is specified and mandated, and supported with some financial incentives, a gentle cloud of inertia will soon descend over the present inquiry’s findings and recommendations, and little practical will result.

Stan Bailey
Associate Professor
School of Curriculum Studies
The University of New England
Armidale NSW 2351

28 February 2001