Application of Differential Normative Criteria to the Gifted Education Screening Phase: Demographic and Programmatic Implications

• In Event: 25.073 - Truth and Consequences: Different Reference Groups in Gifted Identification

Abstract

Typically, when students are identified for gifted services, a single cut score or criteria are applied across all data points and students under consideration. Students who perform at or above those criteria are identified, while those who score below are not. Even when multiple / measures or pathways exist, each is assigned a given eligibility threshold regardless of student variables. Since 2005 when Lohman wrote his seminal piece on Identifying Academically Talented Minority Students, non-traditional normative criteria (e.g., local and group-specific norms) have become common topics of discussion within the field as ways to better identify members of underrepresented groups as well as a means to better align identification with the philosophical goals of talent development.

When local or group specific norms are utilized, it’s most often to the confirmation or eligibility phase of student identification – to the criterion that actually determines service eligibility. However, the most common time for students to be evaluated with this confirmation phase is following a teacher or parent nomination. This two-phase system – where students must first pass through a screening phase before being formally considered in the confirmation phase – is the most common form of gifted identification (NAGC, 2015). The screening phase determines who is formally evaluated via the confirmation phase, whereas the confirmation phase determines who is served in gifted education. Past research has found that high screening phase criteria are harmful to overall system sensitivity and that they are disproportionately harmful to students from traditionally underrepresented groups. Little attention has been paid to how screening phase criterion might be modified, within the context of fixed confirmation phase criteria, in order to identify larger numbers of students from traditionally underrepresented programs for gifted services. Here is an example of what this might look like in practice:

Multi-phase system with consistent criteria
Screening phase: Any student who scores at the 90th percentile (national norm) on a universally-administered achievement test passes the screening phase.

Confirmation phase: Those who pass the screening phase are then given an individually-administered intelligence test. Those who score two standard deviations above the mean are identified for gifted services.

Multi-phase with differential criteria
Screening phase: Any student who scores at the 90th percentile on a universally-administered achievement test passes the screening phase. In addition, students from low-income families who score at the 90th percentile compared to other students from low-income families also pass the screening phase.

Confirmation phase: Those who pass the screening phase are then given an individually-administered intelligence test. Those who score two standard deviations above the mean are identified for gifted services.

Research Question:
How do differential screening phase criteria a) influence the demographic representation of the identified gifted population and b) influence the range of learning needs in the newly-identified population? The end result will be recommendations for how school districts can retain a consistent confirmation phase criterion that is often state mandated, while still modifying the screening phase criteria to identify larger numbers of students from traditionally underrepresented groups.

Authors

• Scott Joseph Peters, University of Wisconsin - Whitewater

• Matthew McBee, East Tennessee State University