I want to start this post by acknowleding that I want school to work for every child who wants to attend. This will be a very lengthy post, as I'm including a copy of a lengthy letter I recently e-mailed.
We homeschool, but this was not our intention and I don't believe that it's the right choice for every child or family. We all know the stereotypes about homeschoolers' superiority complexes and other similar assumptions. I am not that person. In fact, if school works for your family and your student, I urge you to attend! For us, it did not work, even at a fabulous school and with amazing staff members.
I have repeatedly assured all readers that I have a profound appreciation of teachers and the staff within the schools. It's no secret that I'm not a fan of the current public school structure, but it doesn't diminish my appreciation for the amazing individuals that maximize the good for so many kids.
Since we have entered the sphere of highly gifted families, I have heard virtually all of them relate wounds they have received from one or more school where they tried to adapt and embrace the school. Consistently, I have been amazed by this. The staff at M's past school seemed almost as concerned about her as we were and most of them were incredibly supportive of our decisions. Some sent personal notes of encouragement & wept with me.
M was in a gifted summer program that was designed by and run through a public school program of sorts. I viewed it no differently than summer camps, and went with our usual approach, the one encouraged by other families in our coop - put her in the low end of the range of grades or ages, and hope for the best. I did. The classes excited her, and it went better than we expected the first week. . . or so we thought until we were at the celebratory open house at the end of the week. I found myself facing a (literally) small man who gave me the gift of empathy toward those families who have been wounded by school officials.
The experience makes me fear that at least some in the schools are more interested in kids being still and quiet than in their academics. . . or at least that conformity trumps intellectual ability. I never thought my rule-kid would effectively be sent away from a program for behavioral reasons. That is how the teacher tried to present things. Here is the letter I sent to the director of the program following that encounter. I'm going to edit for some semblance of anonymity.
Dear Ms *****,
I'm following up on the voicemail I left you late today.
Today, my husband and I attended the Open House for the ***** class. We were escorted back with other parents about 3:00. A few minutes after entering the classroom, Mr ***** asked me to talk with him while my husband was with M.
He expressed his concerned about how she had struggled through the week. This surprised me, as my daughter usually tells me about struggles she's having before an instructor notes them, and she had not relayed anything I thought was significant during the week. Mr ***** had many things to say, but his overall message was that she is too young and immature for the class, and that he was increasingly uncomfortable about the ***** class the week of *****. He repeatedly said that he had talked to you about # and up being the age range, and that most kids going into #th grade are already #. I started to tell him that M is less than # weeks too young by state standards to be in #th grade this Fall [the director had urged me to do my best in enrolling her at her academic level, rather than her age], but he cut me off with more concerns. The registration forms for the summer school program never even asked for her age, only her grade, so I'm confused about all of the age references. Perhaps this is something you and Mr ***** need to clarify between you.
Our daughter is small for her age, and my husband had noted Mr *****'s pointed comment about the #th grade class when he walked her back the first day, but Mr ***** didn't mention it to myself or my husband until this afternoon more directly. I'm disappointed that we were not included sooner, when adjustments could have been made. I'm also disappointed that he approached us the way he did. He was more cautious with his words to my husband, who asked him some questions after I took over with our daughter. My husband has a significant stature and tends to get more serious consideration and respect than me, his small wife who is mistaken for a much younger person. That doesn't endear me to the teacher any more, as you may guess.
Here are some of the things that were said to us by Mr ***** in my closest recollection, and I often have near perfect recall. He repeatedly cut me off, personally, so he probably heard very little of my response to it, nor did he seem interested in it. He chose to pass me off to *****, who was a much better person to interact with, anyway. My responses to Mr. *****'s concerns are below:
"She doesn't fit in."
What do I even say to that? Unprofessional and inappropriate come to mind. My daughter doesn't fit in most of the time & most places. That's a very common state of being for highly gifted individuals.
"She had trouble with a cover sheet we did on the computer. I basicly did her cover sheet for her."
There was no mention of computer involvement in the class description. She does not use the computer often and is unfamiliar with most programs, but I had no reason to believe this would present a problem in the class.
"She kept saying she was done with things and asking when we were going to eat."
I find it hard to believe that this something a teacher of his reported (repeatedly to us) experience hasn't experienced.
"She should be with kids of her own maturity level. There are some #[younger] year-old classes where she would do better."
I find it extremely arrogant that a man who has spent one week teaching my daughter would think he knows what would work best for her. I have spent the last year and a half homeschooling her following consultation with Dr Deborah Ruf, among others. Also, in a gifted educational program, I am astonished that this would be recommended. Many studies agree that the only age group that highly gifted children don't relate to better than their peers do, are their peers. In most cases, they relate best to people older than themselves.
"She doesn't have the stamina to last an entire day."
She went through several weeks at ***** museum camps, which were all day without an issue of stamina ever coming up. Also, ***** museum has an age waiver for her to be in the #[3 years older]+ class because she gets bored in their classes at her age level. Her ***** teacher from last Fall considers her to be perfectly equal to ths class [this was the same subject and this same teacher with a Master's Degree in Education wrote the required reference letter that was part of our application to the program], and M has completed ***** [a more advanced class on the same subject]. I am bewildered that Mr ***** would think she isn't up to the task. He is in the minority in that opinion.
"Her immature behavior made me and the other students uncomfortable"
This was to my husband, whose never-a-poker-face expression silenced Mr ***** on the subject. I recollected the several students who I witnessed going out of their way to say goodbye to her by name at pick-up, and find it strange that they would single her out to say goodbye if uncomfortable around her. I also find this unprofessional of him and irrelevent to the class in question.
He said much more, and I shall try to forget most of it. The bottom line is that she is not welcome in his class, and after what we heard today, we would prefer he not have influence on her for future classes, anyway. We would like a full refund for the ***** class [which had not yet occurred, but had the same teacher assigned].
While I understand that this is a gifted program, I don't think that Mr ***** is aware of the different levels of giftedness. It felt like he wanted cookie cutter kids. Many of his complaints were related to classroom familiarity, which our daughter hasn't had as much for [more than a year], although she has consistently been in classes at ***** museum, coop, and several other places. While I understand that this can complicated a classroom environment, I don't believe it should be such a huge issue for only 2 weeks of class - 10 days. She's not disrespectful. She's very concerned about following rules - stops at each new place and reads through the posted rules before interacting with the new environment. She has indiosynchrosies, but is extremely compliant.
Here's the other thing. Most of the behaviors he indicated as proving she is too young for the class are common in [the vast majority of kids in our] Homeschool coop, and most of those students are older than M. One of my closest friends has a neurotypical son who is #[years older] and displays the same behaviors more severely. . .
I have met mostly fabulous professionals within the schools. The school system does not work for our daughter, as indicated by past trials and in the opinion of Deborah Ruf (I assumed you knew her, and *** did, but just in case - she's a local educational psychologist & author specializing in giftedness - nationally known . . .). Dr Ruf explained our situation to us by indicating that in M's school district at the time (*****) there were statistically # kids like her in the entire district in her grade, so most likely not in the same school (since there are # gradeschools) or class. We were fortunate to encounter almost unanymous support as we tried to work with our school, and I have yet to meet another family in a similar situation that can say that. In the end, it didn't work.
***** [another teacher at the summer program] met M in a class in ***** (and remembered her face upon seeing it this week), and emphasized how much she'd be great in this program, so we decided to give it a try. ***** was such a fabulous and enthusiastic teacher of **** kids & excited by their indiosynchrosies & intensities, which bodes well. Only one other family we've met had tried **** and they had a bad experience, but we thought it was probably that they weren't able to actually sign up at their functional grade level [it's complicated]. You allowed me to sign her up (with appropriate proof of her capacity) where it looked like the best fit, for which I was grateful & without which we would not have signed up. With her aged only a few weeks younger than the low end of the age range, I felt it was a good possibility. I am convinced that with a different teacher this would have been a successful adventure. However, it ended up being quite upsetting for both myself and my husband. M is disappointed that she will not be attending *****. We told her that we didn't think this teacher was a good fit for her and so we were cancelling it. We chose not to tell her about Mr *****'s role and comments for obvious reasons.
As someone who is a passionate proponent of highly gifted education and individuals, I want all programs associated with giftedness to be successful for the good of all the individuals involved as well as their spehere of influence through their lives - it's so important . . . However, I think a good understanding of which of those programs work together is necessary to minimize further pain to families affected by this. Yes, our special population encounters a great deal of pain. Our experience with Mr. ***** tody is quite similar to what most of the families in our coop have experienced with schools of all varieties - some of them in several different attempted schools. Some of the families drive ***** each way to be a part of the coop - there just isn't a lot out there for these kids. Mr ***** is right in saying that her maturity level is low. However, her intellectual level is ridiculously high. That makes things difficult from multiple angles. We would have been fine if he had stuck to saying that it wasn't a good fit for *****, if it had come earlier in the week and we had the chance to see if we could all work together to improve the situation. The timing of the information and the additional steps he took were highly offensive. I would urge teachers not to assume they know what's best for a child better than the parents without a great deal of information, which he did not have and could not have had after only one week with M. I was a teacher for # years, and learned that parents almost always know best.
There are gifted students in the schools. There are also many levels of giftedness and some of them do not tolerate the current school structure in this country. In a gifted program, I assumed the teachers would understand more than Mr ***** seemed to. I really wanted this to work, but maybe Mr ***** is right and she just doesn't fit in. Perhaps she's too highly gifted, along with all of the challenges that includes. It's not better, and it's certainly not easier. Even within gifted programs, we have these struggles. I never wanted that for her. I never wanted her to be anything but normal and happy. She is not normal. However, I intend to keep her as happy as possible.
I'm a babbler, obviously (in case you had forgotten from our couple of phone conversations). This is a subject that has been a huge one in our lives for a while now, so that exacerbates my babbling. Please let us know when/how we will received the requested full refund. Of course, I'd be happy to interact with you further on how this might become a more successful option for children like our daughter and those within our coop.
Regards,
Jen
I want to give full credit where it's due. A man involved in the program attempted to find another class for M. He was open to talking to me about how we approach things, asking questions, and recommending certain teachers over others, having spoken with M on several occasions throughout the week. He did his best to intervene and help both my husband and myself separately. My husband used language I almost never hear from him, but only directed at the teacher, and only when I was the only one to hear it. The message he received (not in so many words) was "your daughter isn't worth it." Daddy was mad! What he said to the helpful gentleman was that we have a big difference of opinion about our daughter and how she should be treated and approached than that teacher.
The director called me very quickly. She apologized for things going so poorly, and regretted that she didn't know M's interests to be able to suggest other classes. She immediately agreed to the refund, and asked us to give it another try in the future. She also talked about how she needs to do more in educating the teachers about how these kids are in different places/levels in different parts of their lives and minds. She asked a lot of questions about how we educate, how M is different than a typical school-child, and really wanted information. I felt that she cared not only about the program working to serve all of the special population she wants to reach, but also that she empathized and wants things to go well for our family. She could not have handled it better.
The teacher talked with the director about the situation during the week, and she reported that he seemed very focused on age. Like us, she asked him how the academic part was going. He had no viable complaints about that, only some vague, weak comments. She was professional, but I got the impression that she shares our opinion about the teacher's inflexibility for the most part. I want the program to work for others, and I felt strongly that this teacher would not help that goal. I hope our communication avoids pain for other families and staff going forward.
Wishing you and your family nothing but joy and fulfillment in your summer plans!
