What Really Happens in Gifted and Talented Education? A Portrait of Three States

In this in-depth, multi-state study, we examined the current state of gifted and talented education identification procedures, service delivery, and curricula in three states. Overall, we found limited alignment between identification and programming. Although districts often identify students as gifted in mathematics and/or language arts, they seldom provide specialized gifted curricula corresponding to these talent areas. This misalignment between identification and services impedes the field’s ability to evaluate program effectiveness, underscoring the need for more cohesive policies and robust program evaluation. Identification of students for gifted services commonly occurs in Grades 2 or 3. Although teacher-rating systems are widely used for universal screening, we raise concerns regarding their comparability across different teachers. Pullout programs remain the dominant service model, followed by cluster grouping and push-in approaches. However, we question the effectiveness of gifted programming that offer only a few hours of services each week. Taken together, these findings underscore the importance of alignment between how students are identified and the scope, rigor, and duration of the services they receive.