A study of 38 letters of finding examined the involvement of the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) in gifted education from 1992-95. Results indicate a majority of complaints handled by OCR involved minority access to gifted programs and an increase in the complaints involving gifted students with disabilities. (CR)

In this interview with Dr. Mary Frasier, the creator of the Frasier Talent Assessment Profile, her passion for discovering and helping develop the talents of children from diverse cultural backgrounds and atypical gifted children is discussed. The need for continued research on the signs of potential abilities in children is stressed. (Contains 2…

This article examines the Office for Civil Rights' (OCR) position on non-discriminatory testing, polices and practices and the role and responsibility of the OCR in securing the civil rights of culturally and linguistically diverse students in the context of gifted education. Possible discriminatory practices in gifted education are outlined.…

In this interview, Mary M. Frasier, the founder and director of the Torrance Center for Creative Studies, discusses attitudes that create barriers to including disadvantaged or minority students in gifted programs. The need for administrators to be truly committed to finding gifted children from underrepresented groups is stressed. (CR)

Nineteen elementary grade teachers who worked with minority, rural, and disadvantaged gifted students participated in a workshop on interdisciplinary active learning. Pretest and posttest scores revealed increased levels of perceived knowledge, skills, and implementation. Mixed results were obtained from comparison with a control group. (DB)

This article focuses on recommended literature for gifted black and other minority students. The use of bibliotherapy with gifted students is described and recommendations are presented for using multicultural literature, along with guidelines for selecting high quality multicultural literature. An annotated bibliography of 10 recommended books is…

Describes the 1991 and 1992 programs of the Baltimore and Washington D.C. Community Outreach Project of The Johns Hopkins University Center for Talented Youth, which targets disadvantaged gifted students. Discusses peer relationships, curriculum development, class time, and achievement, concluding that appropriate intervention is essential in…

Discusses the consistent underrepresentation of minority groups in gifted programs and legal issues surrounding the identification of gifted students, including the relationship between classification and government purpose. Model legislation that defines gifted students and traditionally underserved populations and declares nondiscriminatory…

This article reports on a project responding to the need for culturally relevant alternatives to existing assessment practices in the identification of giftedness among rural Mexican Americans in the southwestern United States. Students identified using multidimensional and holistic procedures showed similar cognitive and performance profiles to…

Suggestions are made for a new paradigm for identifying talent potential in underserved populations. Suggestions focus on dynamic assessment of gifted behaviors within students' own sociocultural contexts, more varied and more authentic assessment, and integrating identification processes with learning opportunities. (Author/PB)

A teacher used selected parts of the Autonomous Learner Model with 24 Hispanic first-graders, half of whom were English-language learners, to promote the educational progress of all of the children and find potentially gifted children. Students quickly learned independence, responsibility, resourcefulness, and higher order thinking skills. Several…

This article begins with an overview of how historic notions of presumed African American intellectual inferiority permeate gifted education. The effect of race and its implications for gifted education are then examined, along with the influence of peer culture on African American schooling. The need for additional research is stressed. (Contains…

A study of 115 Hispanic and 119 Anglo fifth-grade students and 12 teachers investigated teachers' nomination rates of Hispanic and Anglo students to gifted-and-talented programs. Results indicated that ethnicity was a factor in teachers' nomination rate and that differences in rates were more pronounced between Hispanic and Anglo females.…

This article posits that increasing minority teachers in gifted and talented (GT) programs will lead to an increase of minority students in GT programs. Ways to recruit and prepare minority teachers are discussed, as are multicultural and bilingual options for GT programs. The need for evaluation data is stressed. (Contains references.) (CR)

This article reviews factors affecting the persistent underrepresentation of black students in gifted education and offers suggestions for recruiting and retaining these students. It is argued that a deficit orientation held by educators hinders access to gifted programs for diverse students, and that too often educators interpret differences as…