The New York Times reports that there’s a new player on the New York City school scene, and for the preschoolers and early elementary students who enroll, it’s all gifted all the time.
In a city where the public school gifted programs have long provided an enviable free education, and there are many expensive private schools that emphasize rigorous academics, the Speyer Legacy School [Note: annual tuition is $28,500], which caters to advanced learners, is a rare breed: a private school with an all-gifted student body. It opened last month with 26 children in kindergarten through second grade in a leased space in the Gateway School.
Named after one of the city’s earliest public schools for gifted students from the 1930s, Speyer Legacy is attracting interest (74 children applied for this fall) at a time when New York’s top public gifted programs and private schools have far more applicants than they have seats. The competition is driven by a boom in the school-age population as more families have multiple children and choose the city over the suburbs, as well as by the city’s own efforts to expand access to gifted classes.
Envious? Wishing there were something similar here in the DC area? Look no further! Montgomery County will soon have the Feynman School, opening its doors in September, 2010. According to the website, which went up last week:
Curious-minded preschoolers will now have the opportunity to learn in a fun, science-based, bilingual environment designed to celebrate and nurture their natural inquisitiveness.
Opening in fall 2010 in Montgomery County, Maryland, Feynman School will serve the DC metro area’s brightest young minds with a dynamic hands-on curriculum built upon exemplary gifted education programs throughout the US.
Feynman School will welcome both 3-year-olds and 4-year-olds during 2010-2011. The school, which is named for Nobel Laureate Dr. Richard Feynman, will eventually grow to also serve K-8.
Frankly, given the growing disenchantment with MCPS gifted services, I’ve been waiting for someone to figure out that there is a ripe market for a school like this. Unlike New York City, where the start-up Speyer Legacy School is “up against the big gun” privates, the playing field in MoCo strikes me as wide open. The closest competitor is across the river in Fairax County, the Nysmith School for the Gifted.
I had a chance to meet with the Feynman School founders, Robert and Susan Gold, over the summer. She’s a former MCPS teacher and her husband is a lawyer with an interest in gifted education born of personal experience. They’re the parents of a two precocious preschoolers who started looking around at preschool and elementary school options and didn’t like what they saw. So they decided to start their own school.
They’ve done extensive research, including visits to the Hollingsworth Preschool at Columbia University mentioned in the Times piece, and have secured permission from Richard Feynman‘s heirs to use his name in conjunction with their school. The school will have a science focus and offer bi-lingual education in Mandarin Chinese and Spanish. Among their other influences they cite Howard Gardner, Daniel Goleman, Joan Smutny, Kendall King, Alison Mackey and David Sousa.
I expect there will be no shortage of people knocking on their doors, and wish them luck. The more choices available for gifted kids, the better.
One thing to beware of is the private GATE school that doesn’t live up to its hype. There’s one in our area that was our first choice until we crunched the numbers and realized there was no way we could afford the $24+k/child annual tuition. Then after we joined a homeschooling support group for families of gifted kids we started hearing all kinds of negative stuff about the school.
A friend whose DS had started reading at age 2 was stuck in a 1st grade class where fewer than half of the other students could read and the school offered him no real accommodation. Now certainly not all gifted kids are early readers (my DH wasn’t) but I would’ve expected the majority to be reading by 1st grade given the IQ cutoff of the school is 145. And certainly a GATE school OUGHT to be able to figure out how to accommodate a kid advanced in reading.
I’m a little skeptical too. Only because they are starting a gifted preschool. I think what we did in preschool was head and shoulders above what any school could do. I regret I sent DD at all. We could have had so much more fun if I’d kept her home. This is a little too serious for preschoolers. You reference Nysmith. And I agree. The more the merrier. But I know homeschoolers who looked into Nysmith and still came away concluding what they had going at home was better. Of course, it doesn’t address the working issue, but I still believe, if you can do homeschooling well, still the better choice.
But we sure could use a PG high school. I’ve long harbored ambitions to start one myself. IQ cutoff 145 with SAT scores to match Davidson as well. I’m not an IQ or score snob. Heck, I unschooled during our lone homeschool year! Only tests that year were chapter ones in her on line geometry course, that’s it. But that’s how I would get my critical mass. I’m thinking boarding school.
I’m looking for an alternative to TJ and Montgomery Blair. Not for my kid, too late, she’s graduating in June. The Washingtonian piece had a very telling comment. One student was quoted, “TJ is not for smart kids. It’s for motivated kids.”
Very very telling. We tend to divide highly gifted kids into two categories. Very motivated and driven or smart slacker. I’m looking for that rare breed, the third category. The consummate intellectual, the child who does not work for grades, who inhales material, who is sensitive and smart and wants to learn all the time.
I’m not after the go go high pressure world of DC. I want my kids getting all the rest their bodies need. That doesn’t mean I won’t cultivate ambition and dreams and soaring as far as your balloon will take you. I just want something different that what already exists, for all the kids (like mine) who need that. Creativity, joy, outdoors, field trips, vibrant discussions, a Great Books high school with some serious kick ass STEM. (Okay, just lost my credibility. Okay, get over it
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You want a heavy homework school where kids have almost no self-directed time? That’s what TJ and Montgomery Blair are for. I’m looking for something different. For the kids who need different. My school would also be well versed in 2e. My daughter did CTY summers for seven years and I’d like to model some of this on that.
Oh, while we are on the subject of the dream school I’d love to create? My school would also be well versed in visual spatial, intensities and sensitivities of profoundly gifted students, emotional-social and in depth learning.
Given that a lot of gifted kids have trouble falling asleep, we’ll start later to accommodate brains that have trouble turning off at night. I’m thinking nothing before 9:30am. You’ll see less anxiety with sufficient sleep.
Strict bedtimes like CTY. They told me early on they don’t allow work to go back to the rooms because these kids would be up all night. Finally! Someone actually gets perfectionism! My experience with gifted school programs is this: Don’t be a perfectionist. We’ll give you lots more work and if you can’t get over the perfectionism, fooey on you. But perfectionism isn’t a cold you get over in seven days! It’s a state of being. I’m not saying you don’t address it. Just not that way!
This is a no-brainer, right? So how come no one is doing it? And I’m just getting started…
J. I love your comments! And I love your idea of a school dedicated to “those” kids. I look at C.’s workload and I just cringe. She is doing two activities after school that keep her there late every day of the week. They feed a part of her and give her a different kind of outlet. But then it’s home and studying. The weekend…studying. Is the day in, day out incessant homework load really necessary? I’ve heard from many people who chose to skip high school that equivalent college classes are actually easier. I have to believe it. Strikes me there’s no time for reflection in high school.
Thanks, switched on! When I pulled DD out for that lone homeschool year in 8th, a woman I highly respect with expertise in gifted education said, “Don’t apply to XYZ school. It’s too much homework!” What should I do instead, I asked. She replied, skip high school and go straight to college.
I politely dismissed that idea as insane. I began to think about it. It no longer struck me as quite so insane. I went in with my eyes open. The relentless homework overload which leads to sleep deprivation saps kids.
A woman who likes my comments on another forum just wrote to me about homeschooling. Her husband is very resistant. The boy is in 7th grade. I am urging her. While there’s still time.
Totally agree. Why do the classes for smart kids have so much homework? I had every minute of every day scheduled in order to get my homework done and extracurriculars in. I was one of few who did something besides school work. When I went to college as a college athlete, with work study and a full course load, there was so much free time, I didn’t know what to do with myself.
So, yes, going straight to college would have appeal.
Now, I look at my kids growing up. They are soon to enter middle school, and I hear that all the GT classes (Howard County) have one hour homework each. We will probably pick and choose because I don’t think this is the right path- unless they are passionately driven in this direction.
Just because you are good at academics shouldn’t mean that’s all you do!