Fayette County Public Schools Gifted/Talented Programs Excel
Our work in the Fayette County Public Schools is guided by two moral imperatives. One is to accelerate the learning of students who are approaching proficiency; the other is to accelerate learning for students who have already reached proficiency and challenge them to become globally competitive.
Classroom instruction must meet the needs and learning styles of all students, assisting struggling learners while including enrichment, depth and complexity for students who are ready to move ahead.
As part of my entry plan work when I was hired in 2015, our school board commissioned an external evaluation of the services the district was providing for students who are identified as gifted and talented. The extensive program review included data analysis, classroom observations, focus groups, interviews and surveys of hundreds of students, families and teachers.
We were delighted to hear from the national experts that our program offerings are among the best in the nation, consistently producing outstanding student achievements. Our district had 2.5 times the national rate of students earn perfect ACT scores this year, and all four of Kentucky’s honorees in the 2018 U.S. Presidential Scholars Program attend Fayette County Public Schools. Although our district accounts for only 6% of the students in Kentucky, 16% of the state’s National Merit Semi Finalists are from FCPS.
The report also concluded that we should identify more students for services, broaden the areas of giftedness we serve, and expand our offerings so that students could receive accelerated instruction in their home schools.
Since then, we have invested $540,000 to hire more G/T teachers, which has allowed us to increase the number of schools with G/T teachers five days a week from four in 2015 to 14 this year.
We have also expanded the areas of gifted and talented services we provide to include art, creativity, dance, drama, general intellectual ability, leadership, and specific academic aptitude in language arts, math, science and social studies.
This intentional investment has enabled us to grow the number of fourth and fifth graders identified for service by 117% in just two years. This year, we have 2,394 gifted and talented elementary school students. Next year, we expect to have 3,415.
Our 2018-19 budget includes an additional $540,000 investment in teachers so that we can continue this expansion of services into our middle schools and ensure that every elementary school has a G/T teacher at least two or three days a week.
Delivering on the promise of excellence in FCPS requires that we not only challenge our students academically, but that we also provide opportunities for them to grow as individuals, to discover their unique gifts and to help them become the best versions of themselves. That’s excellence you can’t buy.