Parents praise Chandler gifted students program

Parents of gifted children are overwhelmingly pleased with the services their students receive in the Chandler Unified School District, according to a survey released last week.

That's little surprise to mom Melissa Townsend, who drove around the East Valley before deciding on Ryan Elementary School's program for her son, sixth-grader Atticus, even though she lives in the Higley Unified School District.

She found Chandler's program, CATS (Chandler Academically Talented Students), to be the best fit for her gifted children, Atticus, and his sister, Hazel, who is in third grade at the same school.

All gifted kids in each grade level are in the same classes for core academic subjects such as reading and math, but then are mainstreamed with other students for classes such as physical education.

"If you took him out and put him in a regular class, he would be different. He would be the kid who would be acing the test and ruining the curve," she said. "Here, sometimes he's at the top, sometimes he's not."

The survey is part of the required forms the Chandler district must submit to the Arizona Department of Education. Two years ago, the state started requiring districts to report on its programs for exceptional learners.

According to the application, the gifted program in Chandler last year cost the district $3.1 million in teacher and program coordinator salaries and benefits, and $113,000 in testing, books, training, parent and community outreach and program evaluation. In addition to regular funding, the district received a $138,842 Gifted Education Additional Assistance grant.

There are 1,400 students in the CATS program in grades kindergarten through 12, said Diane Hale, assistant director for gifted education.

Chandler's self-contained program for grades kindergarten through eighth grade is about 30 years old, Hale said. Only about 12 percent of gifted programs in the state are self-contained.

In 2006, the state Legislature adopted a bill that increased attention on gifted education in Arizona. While gifted programs were already required, there were too many variables around the state, said Peter Liang, director of gifted education and advanced placement for the state education department.

"It really enhanced what was in place before ... and made several substantive changes," he said. "What the Legislature did was recognize gifted learners are gifted all day, every day. And not just an hour a week, which is what a lot of programs looked like in the past.

"The Legislature recognized the importance of looking at the whole child, not just the academic side, but the emotional and social side."

That social piece was important to Atticus and Hazel's mother, who said that before he entered Chandler's program Atticus was ridiculed for always knowing the answers. In a classroom with 27 other gifted students at Ryan Elementary, he can be himself.

"To be with people who won't make fun of him when he says he likes to spell or 'I like to play chess,' there's respect," she said.

Townsend praised Atticus' teacher, Michael Buist, for being part of that. Buist was with many of the students in fifth grade and moved up with them this year.

"The interesting thing about these kids is they're all similar in reasoning and thinking skills," he said. "They can all reason and think critically, but they have different skills."

Buist's goal is to help students make the most of those differences - be it a strong ability in math, reading or another area.

Buist, who specializes in gifted education as part of his teacher certification, said it's a challenge he enjoys. "There's energy when you put 28 kids who are extremely bright, then challenge them to work up to their potential and hopefully above that point," he said. "It's hard to tell where their potential will be."