Applying gifted education pedagogy to total talent development for all students

Schoolwide Enrichment and Educational Reform

Most efforts to make major changes in schooling have failed. Although there is endless speculation about why schools are so resistant to change, most theorists and policymakers have concluded that tinkering with single components of a complex system will give only the appearance of school improvement rather than the real and lasting change so desperately sought by educational leaders (Schmoker, 2004). Examples of single-component tinkering are familiar to most educators. Creating more rigorous curriculum standards, for example, without providing improved curricular materials and teachers able to use the materials effectively, negates any potential value that new standards may have for improving academic performance. Similarly, single-component tinkering designed to force change in classrooms (e.g., high-stakes testing) may create the illusion of improved achievement, but the reality is increased pressure on schools to expand the use of compensatory learning models that, so far, have contributed only to the dumbing down of curriculum and the lowering of academic standards. Teacher empowerment, school-based management, an extended school day and year, and revised teacher certification requirements are merely apparitions of change when state or central office regulations prescribe the curriculum by using tests that will determine whether schools get high marks for better performance.

How, then, do we establish an effective change process--one that overcomes the long record of failed attempts? The leverage for meaningful change depends on breaking two mindsets: (a) one person or single group knows the right answer, and (b) change is linear. The only reasonable solution is to develop a process whereby the adoption of policy and the adoption of practice proceed simultaneously! Policymakers and practitioners need to collaborate, during all phases of the change process by examining local capacity and motivation in conjunction with the desired changes. Thus, neither policymakers nor practitioners, by themselves, can reform schools; instead, both must come together to shape a vision and develop the procedures that will be needed to realize and sustain that vision. Senge (1990) compares "visioneering" to the hologram, a three-dimensional image created by interacting light sources:

   When a group of people come to share a vision ...
   each sees his or her own picture. Each vision represents
   the whole image from a different point of view.
   When you add up the pieces of the hologram, the image
   does not change fundamentally, but rather becomes
   more intense, more lifelike, more real in the
   sense that people can truly imagine achieving it. The
   vision no longer rests on the shoulders of one person
   [or one group], but is shared and embodies the passion
   and commitment of all participants. (p. 312)

The Schoolwide Enrichment Model has been developed around a shared vision that my colleagues in The Neag Center for Gifted Education and Talent Development at the University of Connecticut and I have had for a number of years. This vision is also embraced by thousands of teachers, school counselors, and administrators with whom we have worked in academic programs and summer institutes that date back to the 1970s. Simply stated, this vision is that schools are places for talent development. Academic achievement is an important part of the vision and the model for school improvement described in the book; however, we also believe a focus on talent development places the need for improved academic achievement into a larger perspective about the goals of education. The things that have made our nation great and our society one of the most productive in the world are manifestations of talent development at all levels of human productivity. From the creators and inventors of new ideas, products, and art forms, to the vast array of people who manufacture, advertise, and market the creations that improve and enrich our lives, there are levels of excellence and quality that contribute to our standard of living and way of life.