SR45 SD1

WHEREAS, the No Child Left Behind Act has forced schools to focus their funding and efforts on the lowest achieving students in order to meet the mandates of Adequate Yearly Progress required by that Act; and

WHEREAS, students who are capable of high academic achievement, become unchallenged or bored and may exhibit behavioral problems in class, and are not reaching their full potential; and

WHEREAS, many families with highly capable children have chosen to send their children to private schools because of a perceived lack of challenging curricula in public schools; and

WHEREAS, the gifted and talented programs that do exist in the public schools often serve a very small percentage of highly capable students; and

WHEREAS, many students deemed "unqualified" for current gifted and talented programs are actually capable of high achievement through "perspiration" and "aspiration"; and

WHEREAS, open-enrollment gifted and talented programs, similar to programs at Kahuku High School and Kahuku Intermediate School, show that many more students than previously contemplated are capable of meeting the demands of rigorous and challenging curricula; now, therefore,

BE IT RESOLVED by the Senate of the Twenty-fourth Legislature of the State of Hawaii, Regular Session of 2007, that the Department of Education is requested to report on current initiatives that provide for high achieving students and to develop a plan and provide information on the implementation of the plan for future areas of improvement, including establishing outcomes, strategies, measures, and timelines, with the goal of twenty per cent of public school students enrolling in gifted and talented programs, honors classes, advanced placement courses, International Baccalaureate programs, or other similar programs designed to provide rigorous and challenging curricula; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the plan include but not be limited to the following:

(1) The number of students currently enrolled in gifted and talented programs or similar programs with highly challenging academic curricula;

(2) Recommendations on ways to increase the number of enrolled students in gifted and talented programs or similar programs with highly challenging academic curricula, in order to reach the goal of twenty per cent of public school students enrolled in such programs;

(3) Recommendations on methods to include students in the gifted and talented programs who may not exhibit the traditional qualifications for acceptance into such programs, but who demonstrate a high aptitude for achievement by other performance measures;

(4) Program recommendations to provide opportunities for potentially high achieving students;

(5) Program recommendations in the areas of language arts, social studies, math, science, fine arts, performing arts, and foreign languages; and

(6) The personnel requirements and costs associated with the comprehensive plan; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Department of Education is requested to make information available regarding gifted and talented programs and courses and on current initiatives for high achieving students via the Internet; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Department of Education is requested to submit its report and plan, including any findings and recommendations, to the Legislature no later than twenty days prior to the convening of the Regular Session of 2008; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that certified copies of this Resolution be transmitted to the Board of Education and the Superintendent of Education.

Report Title:

DOE; High Achieving Students; Report; Plan

THE SENATE	S.R. NO.	45
TWENTY-FOURTH LEGISLATURE, 2007		S.D. 1
STATE OF HAWAII