NYC Gifted and Talented Program and Testing

Well, the wait is over for thousands of NYC parents as the gifted and talented test results were released this past Saturday. Some parents had to wait until Sunday before they received the email from the Dept of Ed. Many parents were disappointed as their darling child got in the 89th percentile as the image below indicates. I know TestingMom.com has been slammed with questions from New York City parents about their child’s scoring. Testing Mom had an emergency tele-seminar this past Sunday where they answered all the questions from parents who just received their test score.

With the new NNAT test added there was speculation that many less children would receive a 99th percentile. This actually is true but still many more children scored in the 99th percentile than are available seats for the citywide G&T programs.  This leaves all the 97th and 98th percentile children with no chance of getting a citywide seat even though the technically do qualify for one.

Here’s an email a NYC parent received from the Dept. of Ed. when asking about their child’s test score:

Dear <PARENT>:

Thank you for your inquiry about your child’s G&T score report- it was nice speaking with you on the phone yesterday. In your email, I noticed you used a combined weighted average of your child’s nonverbal and verbal percentile rank scores to calculate the overall percentile rank.  As you will see below, this was not the method used to score the G&T assessments.

The New York City Department of Education (DOE)’s Gifted & Talented (G&T) testing vendor scored the assessments using raw scores, normalized standard scores based on age, and percentile ranks for the Naglieri Nonverbal Abilities Test (NNAT-2) and the verbal Otis Lennon School Ability Test (OLSAT-8).

Your child’s raw scores show the number of items your child answered correctly. There were 48 total test items on the nonverbal NNAT-2 and 30 total test items on the verbal OLSAT-8. Since the NNAT-2 and the OLSAT-8 are two different tests that were administered together, the raw scores for each test needed to be placed on a common scale in order to determine percentile ranks. This type of score is called a normalized standard score, and is shown on your child’s score report as NAI (nonverbal standard score, for the NNAT-2) and SAI (verbal standard score, for the OLSAT-8). The use of standard scores like the NAI and SAI is standard practice in testing for ability and intelligence, especially in young children.

Your child’s score report also showed two types of percentile ranks: the domain percentile ranks and the overall percentile rank. The domain percentile ranks are separate scores that correspond to the NAI and the SAI, respectively. Your child’s overall G&T percentile rank determines whether he is eligible to apply for district and citywide G&T programs. The NAI counted for 65% of the overall percentile rank and the SAI counted for 35% of the overall percentile rank. These weighted standard scores, not the domain percentile ranks, were then combined to generate your child’s overall G&T percentile rank score.

I hope this answers your questions. Please do check the G&T website regularly for the most up to date information on this year’s G&T process.

Best,
New York City Department of Education Office of Academic Policy

So, what’s next? The school tours have begun and there’s really no standard process for that either. It varies from school to school so check the gifted and talented school you are interested in touring and find out the process. Some you will have to register online while others you’ll have to call on the phone to register for a school tour. The deadline for G&T applications is next Friday, April 19, 2013 which must be submitted online by midnight.