Seattle Closes Gifted Talented Schools - Cites Racial Inequities

Seattle had a 'gifted program' with special schools that operated at a gifted level. The city had to close them down because there were not enough Hispanic and black students who qualified to get in the program. Black parents of students asked the school to bring in underqualified black and Hispanic students to make up the percentage and to keep the schools open. Essentially throwing children into classrooms in which they had no way of being able to keep up with the work. Seattle decided not to do that and to just close the schools, doing a huge disservice to the gifted children who are now going to have to go to the dumbed-down-to-the-lowest-level classes with the rest of the kids.

This kid of crap is just another example of why America is falling behind academically and in the world in regards to technology and science and math.

"Not enough" black and Hispanic kids qualify ... so shut it down and do a major disservice to the kids who DO qualify. All based on skin color.

Seattle Closes Gifted Talented Schools Cites Racial Inequities

Seattle has shuttered its gifted and talented programs because the school board determined they had too many white and Asian students.

The district began phasing out its Highly Capable Cohort schools and classrooms for advanced students in the 2021-22 school year because they found it had too many racial inequities. School bosses said black and Hispanic students were underrepresented at the schools.

According to Seattle Public School data, of the highly capable students in the 2022-23 school year, 52 percent were white, 16 percent were Asian and 3.4 percent were black.

During a January 22, 2020, school board meeting, parents of black students in the Highly Capable Cohort asked the board to consider finding ways to incorporate students of color into the gifted program rather than shut it down.

Then school board vice president Chandra Hampson slammed those parents saying, 'this is a pretty masterful job at tokenizing a really small community of color within the existing cohort.'

a reply to: FlyersFan
If I had published this topic, I would have immediately received accusations of Russian propaganda from you)))

a reply to: FlyersFan

Hmm.. had a hard time finding any quotes in your link that stated they wanted under qualified kids to be allowed in. I did find a few more facts though about the situation.

All students are screened every single year in grades one through eight for an ability to learn at an accelerated pace. This has been the practice at SPS for the past three years.

For years if a student didn’t get placed in the highly capable program, Seattle parents could pay to get their student privately tested, which often resulted in higher test scores. That meant families with the money to pay for private testing often got into cohort schools. The district also typically screened students on a Saturday, disadvantaging families who didn’t know or who didn’t have transportation.

We've certainly heard of wealthy children benefiting from additional resources that many do not have to gain advantage over them in higher level education.

In regard to the children in the cohort school already:

Highly capable classes also didn’t help all of their students as much as parents believed because some kids missed out on foundational skills, especially in math, SPS’ math department found. 

They found evidence that some learners only got a surface level understanding of other subjects, as well, because teachers moved so quickly through the curriculum.

Seattle Times

Just adding some context to the statements in the OP that they wanted to add under qualified kids.

originally posted by: frogs453
.. had a hard time finding any quotes in your link that stated they wanted under qualified kids to be allowed in.

They said this - "parents of black students in the Highly Capable Cohort asked the board to consider finding ways to incorporate students of color into the gifted program rather than shut it down"

That's bringing in students of color, simply because they are of color, and not because they are qualified. That's bringing in unqualified students just to bring up the quota.

a reply to: frogs453

Hmm.. had a hard time finding any quotes in your link that stated they wanted under qualified kids to be allowed in.

It's entirely possible to say something without actually "saying" it.
This wrong-headed thinking by the DEI people is hurting everyone, and it's why we're seeing kids graduating from high school, unable to read and write.

a reply to: FlyersFan

Another win under the Bidumb administration. Should we cheer ?

"Cheers"

Yup. Don't ever lift up the downtrodden, but always drag down the successes they keep telling people to strive for, and when they achieve the goals, strip it back to zero. Makes sense. The whole problem is a cover-up for the Education Failures screwed up by the Educators. 😃

a reply to: frogs453

So how do scholars explain why millions of dollars allocated to big education causes this mass failure by "educators" that can't make success after decades of funding? 🤣🤣

a reply to: FlyersFan

The end result of course will be that many parents of gifted kids will simply leave the area or find a way to enroll their kids in private schools, or home school. And all the while the elites in charge "wonder" how come it is that support for public education is plummeting.

It really makes one wonder if the educrats in charge are intentionally trying to rid the schools of whites and Asians. They are surely succeeding.

originally posted by: RussianTroll
a reply to: FlyersFan
If I had published this topic, I would have immediately received accusations of Russian propaganda from you)))

Well, you were apparently choosing your battles with this one.

Remember when we all used to know that MSM was BS, and we would try to find the real meaning, behind their fake BS reasons for doing/writing stuff ?

Seems like everyone just wants to believe MSM these days ...

a reply to: FlyersFan

Ah, the dem playbook. Spend decades of taxpayer dollars promising a solution, actually make it worse, then lower the standards to make it seem like they accomplished something. It's been that way as long as I've been alive. So, I do t trust dems. They're hopeless. I won't hire them, hang out with them, help them, or trust them them in any conceivable way.

a reply to: Boogerpicker

I will. How are we going to get them to wake up if we just do them like they did us when they were in a position to lord over a peon under them.

I read several articles about this issue. Seems there were black children attending the school.

The district basically called the parents of the black children Oreos for not supporting the shutdown of the school.

The black children who went to the Seattle school for gifted kids, that had "too many" Asian and White kids, the parents of the black kids, and the black kids themselves who begged for the school to stay open, were called by the liberal district representative "tokenized". www.msn.com... ng-black-parents-who-complained-about-move-tokenized/ar-BB1kZ178
Just as liberals love to call Senator Tim Scott and other black people who are smart, gifted, and do their best to succeed, and do succeed.

Liberals and Democrats often imply with these racial slurs that black people
who succeed, are smart, are gifted are "not really black",
as Biden said
about black people who did not vote for him in 2020.

This says a great deal about how liberal leftists really feel about black people.

Democrats want no voter ID because they say it discriminates against black people. The clear implication is that liberal Democrats think black people are too stupid to drive a car, get a bank account, get on welfare, get a credit card, get health coverage, drink alcohol legally - because all of the above require a photo ID. But liberals say so many black people are too ignorant to be able to figure out how to function in today's society, so requiring an ID to vote is racist. Because black people are so stupid they can't figure out how to get a free one that every state offers, or how to use a bus or uber to get to a location where they can get a free state ID.

Liberal leftists and Democrats love to talk about the poor black people who have to be excused from getting an ID because they are inherently incapable of doing so.

If black people are capable, smart, gifted, working hard, a success but not in a government job or a politician, or a hollywood leftist then they are oreos, tokens etc.

That is exactly what Democrats think about black people, it is clear and has been for decades.

There's a dark side to the whole G.A.T.E. Program thing -

originally posted by: frogs453

We've certainly heard of wealthy children benefiting from additional resources that many do not have to gain advantage over them in higher level education.

It seems like this has been coming up a lot more lately some kids get extra prep work paid for and others don't. Why should anyone care? It's like me saying I can't afford a Tesla. So, either all get one or none.

a reply to: FlyersFan

I won't even drive my truck into Seattle. If dispatch sends me
there I dial their number and ask do you want me to bring this truck
or do ypu have some where else to go? As far as I give a rats ass
Seattle can starve.

originally posted by: FlyersFan

originally posted by: frogs453
.. had a hard time finding any quotes in your link that stated they wanted under qualified kids to be allowed in.

Advanced learning or gifted schools are points of competition with parents , because a child with a K-12 schooling from an advanced learning center is way further ahead in getting into elite colleges.
So wealthy parents send their kids to private prep schools at night or weekends to teach a child how to prepare for the screenings of the gifted school’s entrance requirements.
As well wealthy parents pay for private screenings which are bias to the money they get in qualifying kids as “ gifted “
It’s a pay to play & black parents don’t have the money on average to dance their kids through all the fluffing.
I find your thoughts to be bigoted at the minimum & racist in nature.
If black or Mexican kids had wealthy parents , then they too could be qualified as “ special “


They said this - "parents of black students in the Highly Capable Cohort asked the board to consider finding ways to incorporate students of color into the gifted program rather than shut it down"

That's bringing in students of color, simply because they are of color, and not because they are qualified. That's bringing in unqualified students just to bring up the quota.

Seattle has fallen so far in some respects from when I lived there and attneded informal classes at the Open University.

I'm sure these kids can just go to a coffeehouse with headphones and study online.

They don't call it Latteland for no reason.

Unless they changed that too.

I have a friend in the area who keeps me in touch with the good stuff left around.

According to their online alternative newspaper, there was wave after wave of vulgar stickers being slapped up all over Capitol Hill by the New Kids.

Pride back then was more laid back and Family friendly.

I shudder to think what might be going on these days with all the vulgarities.

The CHAZ/CHOP spectacle was abysmal and failed spectacularly.

The only thing I found funny was the "community garden" on the baseball field on Cap Hill which was just a dumped bag of potting soil and a single tomato plant.

Reminded me of other failed social experiments in a sad way.

I mean, it's not the soil, that's fertile and good, but the community garden should still be a few blocks South (I forget the location) but it was reserved for an older building that may have been demolished in favor of another high rise.

In their defense the nonprofits trying to get an old hotel up and running for low income residents who qualified got funding and it fixed up and allievated the burden of single mother families and other resisdents who were displaced when the Newcomers moved in and started their upgrades.

Gentrfication is both a blessing and a curse, and they are still dealing with biohazard crews for folks who don't use the disposal bins for needle waste and those who have to use the restroom in an emergency but that's just at last report.

I haven't checked in in a while, maybe I should.

Things might be on the mend.

Still sounds like there's some issues though with the news headlining this thread.

I'll report back or you can read for yourself at The Stranger

It's the only print media left in town.

The website doesn't have the indy comics or certain features, but it covers the meat and potatoes of the scene.

originally posted by: Justoneman
a reply to: Boogerpicker

I will. How are we going to get them to wake up if we just do them like they did us when they were in a position to lord over a peon under them.

Advanced learning or gifted schools are points of competition with parents , because a child with a K-12 schooling from an advanced learning center is way further ahead in getting into elite colleges.
So wealthy parents send their kids to private prep schools at night or weekends to teach a child how to prepare for the screenings of the gifted school’s entrance requirements.
As well wealthy parents pay for private screenings which are bias to the money they get in qualifying kids as “ gifted “
It’s a pay to play & black parents don’t have the money on average to dance their kids through all the fluffing.
I find your thoughts to be bigoted at the minimum & racist in nature.
If black or Mexican kids had wealthy parents , then they too could be qualified as “ special