The Secret Lives of Gifted Kids

At some point in early 1982, I was tested for the gifted program in Orange County, Florida. I didn’t know really what that meant, but my fourth-grade teacher must have suggested it.  I aced all my tests, and I won spelling bees, and I gave her the least amount of crap in a class full of wild kids.  What she could not have known was that since I was originally from New York State, I was already advanced because they just started teaching concepts much earlier or faster than in Florida.  So, what I mean is, for grades 4 through 6, I coasted on a lot of shit I had already learned in Syracuse, New York.

            Which means that even at the beginning of becoming a gifted kid I felt like a fraud.

            I also didn’t understand that if I was really a fraud that they would have figured it out immediately.  IQ tests are given for different reasons.  Grades are just one indicator.  But I didn’t know the other ones.  My mom says she learned what my IQ score was but has since forgotten, which I believe because it happened in the 1980’s. What is a gifted IQ?  North of 121.  Average is roughly 85-115.  Around 6% of the populace is 121 or over.  144 and above is the level of genius. Those are the facts. Do with them what you will.  I only know that once I hit the fifth grade in a different school I was in ‘gifted’ class with a bunch of other gifted kids.

            Different schools have different approaches to gifted kids.  Here in Oregon, it’s just part of your file.  You get some more time with guidance counselors.  All my kids qualified with IQ’s in the high 120’s, but it didn’t change their weekly routines much.  When I was in elementary school, gifted was an entire day.  One day a week we were in a separate classroom with one teacher doing completely different projects than in the regular classes.  I say projects because we weren’t taught like a traditional class.  It was weird.  There were discussions led by the teachers and independent study projects. We learned about problems solving and semantics and how language worked rather than just vocabulary words.

            I liked it.  I really did.  I made nearly all of my friends from that class of weirdos.

            That’s the good shit.

            The rest of my life as a gifted kid was mostly a pain in the ass.

            First of all, all the kids who weren’t in gifted class resented you because they couldn’t disappear from the regular shitty class once a week.  We were responsible for the work we missed while in gifted but I never did it. (That’s an entirely different issue.) There was also a unavoidable thing floating in the air while in those fifth and sixth grade classes.  I felt the gifted teacher did not like me.  I can’t explain it, but I had the feeling then and to this day.  She didn’t like talking to me and spent more time with other kids.  I never had that relationship with other teachers.  Usually, I was singled out as a good kid because I didn’t give them any shit.  I don’t know.  It could all be in my head but I felt it hard back then.

When we hit junior high and high school gifted classes became like AP classes.  We had Gifted English one year then Gifted History the next. Faster-paced classes with more projects and homework.  The plus side was that I saw the same kids year after year but the minus was that my study skills were terrible and no one checked my report card. (Also…different issue.)

            My own kids told me year after year they were pressured by faculty to excel in school and in the future.  That fact mixed with their own anxieties led to three separate meltdowns in their respective senior years.  I should have seen it coming, but they handled the rigor of studying much better than I did.  They were all in advanced classes including math, which I was sorely lacking.  But gifted kids are infamously fragile.  When I talk about it, it reminds me of all the adjectives I use when I describe my anxiety.  Feeling too much, thinking too much, indecision, fraud.

            You may wonder why.  You may wonder why someone born with a special gift that helps them learn faster and retain more has such a tough time in this culture.  Someone who makes connections of thought and forges unique ideas.  Well, I have my theory:  We live in a country that DOES NOT VALUE INTELLIGENCE.  Our country values money.  That’s it.  Your ability to generate wealth is the number one factor of success and anything less than that is a waste of time. If you can’t convert your natural talents into cash flow then your talent is totally pointless. But you want to know a secret? Any dumbass can get rich.  Doesn’t matter.  Business sense is as basic as playing tic-tac-toe.  Anyone can do it.  It’s based on personality and drive. That’s why it is valued.  If you work hard and you are a little lucky (and a dozen other factors that are out of your control) you can be successful at business.  And businessmen run the show.  Do businesspeople like academics, in general?  Teachers?  Scientists?  Artists?  Not really.  Why?  Because they value something other than money. They don’t play the same game; the game they control. They’ve also successfully convinced us that an intelligent person who hasn’t converted that talent into a fat bank account isn’t really smart at all.  He’s a loser.

            So, America resents smart people. They think their mere existence is an affront to their own intelligence.  I have to watch what I say for the rest of my life in fear of ‘making someone feel bad’ about their own brain.  I mean, I did.  I’ve put an end to that.  If I’m talking and you think I’m a showoff or an elitist, then good. It’s because I am a showoff.  An elitist.  It certainly has nothing to do with you and your own self-image.  So be it.

            I taught high school for a very brief time and I was lucky enough to have a class of gifted ninth graders who were sweethearts.  I put this topic up for discussion and I got an overwhelming response that being labeled as gifted sucked.  They hated being separated from the pack and the undo expectations that come with it. It blew my mind.  These were smart kids who hated being smart.  At least in a high school setting.  I didn’t know what to tell them.  One of my longtime gifted class friends is a full-time gifted teacher and I wonder if the climate is the same. I can’t imagine a culture that belittles and undervalues the naturally intelligent.  What a resource to have.  Think of the problems that could be tackled, and the culture you could build with smart people on the front lines. 

            Just imagine.