Young Scholars

Abstract

The Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS) Young Scholars model offers new language and ideas for thinking about giftedness that embrace expanded beliefs about the nature of intelligence and highlight the importance of nurturing intelligent behavior in children from diverse cultural, ethnic, and linguistic backgrounds as early as possible. These expanded beliefs move beyond an exclusionary vocabulary that is based on a child’s proficiency in skills that are taught in school or a single score on a standard ability test and instead focus on a child’s ability to think, reason, and problem-solve through evidence and assessments that cross cultural, ethnic, and linguistic boundaries. The Young Scholars model is embedded in a continuum of gifted services offered to a broad range of learners, and it has the capacity to be an important vehicle for change. Young Scholars are students who historically have been underrepresented in gifted programs. This includes students from poverty, students whose primary language is not English, and twice exceptional learners. Staff at Young Scholars schools work together to find and nurture gifted potential as early as kindergarten to ensure that no student is overlooked. The model has two goals: (a) to identify students who may not be considered for gifted programs using traditional methods of identification, and who, without that opportunity, are less likely to pursue advanced levels of learning on their own; and (b) to nurture gifted potential at an early age so that Young Scholars will be prepared to engage in challenging subject matter and rigorous courses in elementary school, middle school, high school, and beyond.