Money over Merit? Socioeconomic Gaps in Receipt of Gifted Services

Abstract

In this essay, Jason A. Grissom, Christopher Redding, and Joshua F. Bleiberg investigate the receipt of gifted services based on the socioeconomic status (SES) of elementary school students and their families. Using nationally representative longitudinal data, they show that gaps in the receipt of gifted services between the highest and lowest SES students are profound, and these gaps remain substantial even after taking into account students' achievement levels and other background factors and using school fxed effects to explain school sorting. The authors discuss several potential approaches schools and districts can use to ameliorate the apparent disadvantages students from low-SES families experience in processes surrounding receipt of gifted services.

Are U.S. Schools Closing the “Gifted Gap”? Analyzing Elementary and Middle Schools’ Gifted Participation and Representation Trends (2012–2016)

“…Grissom et al (2019) also find that even among students with similar achievement and other background characteristics, higher SES students are more likely to receive gifted services than lower SES students, even within the same school. Considering the many family and neighborhood factors as well as raw economic differences between low- and high-poverty students, it is important that local school districts recognize how these students’ needs vary.…”

“You Need to be More Responsible” The Myth of Meritocracy and Teachers’ Accounts of Homework Inequalities

“…Taken-for-granted practices in education serve as status-reinforcing processes when they amplify and then justify the inequitable treatment of students from different status groups. Tracking, ability grouping, gifted programming and standardized testing are key examples of such practices (Grissom et al 2019;Grodsky et al 2008;Horn 2018;Joensen and Nielsen 2009;Knoester and Au 2017;Kohn 2000;Lewis and Diamond 2015;Oakes 1982;Rist 1970;Rose and Betts 2004;Sacks 1997;Tyson 2011). In this paper, we reveal that homework practices can also operate as status-reinforcing processes.…”

“…In a parallel way, math homework can rationalize and erase resources that influence students' ostensible success. In doing so, it may ultimately exacerbate longstanding inequalities in student achievement (Bowers 2011;Sirin 2005), discipline/punishment (Morris and Perry 2016;Rios 2011;Shedd 2015;Tyson 2003), and course taking/placement (Gamoran and Mare 1989;Grissom et al 2019;Kelly 2009;Tyson and Roksa 2016). Thus, homework may also contribute to and naturalize the "logic of merit" and "logic of deficits" (Oakes and Rogers 2007) which portray "winners" in education as deserving advantages due to their merit and "losers" as deserving disadvantages due to their deficits.…”

“…In the U.S., despite known limitations of standardized tests (Becker 1972), mathematics performance is seen as a core indicator of students' aptitude (Stevenson and Stigler 1994;Uttal 1997). U.S. schools thus use students' math grades and test scores to determine ability-group, gifted program, and track placements from a very early age (Gamoran and Mare 1989;Grissom et al 2019;Lewis and Diamond 2015;Oakes 2005;Oakes et al 1990;Tyson 2011). Ability grouping and tracking influence students' math confidence and anxiety (Boaler 2002;Horn 2008) and their course-taking trajectories (Battey and Leyva 2016;Long, Conger, and Iatarola 2012;Muller et al 2010;Planty, Provasnik, and Daniel 2007).…”

“…Many taken-for-granted school practices operate as what we call status-reinforcing processes. These include tracking, ability grouping, gifted programming, and standardized testing (Barlow and Dunbar 2010;Gamoran and Mare 1989;Grissom, Redding, and Bleiberg 2019;Grodsky, Warren, and Felts 2008;Horn 2018;Joensen and Nielsen 2009;Knoester and Au 2017;Kohn 2000; Lewis and Diamond 2015;Oakes 1982;Rist 1970;Rose and Betts 2004;Sacks 1997;Staiger 2004;Tyson 2011).…”