 Should high school gifted programs be banned?
spooneybarger: Number of wtf questions:"putting a huge amount of effort into such a program is a huge waste of time that is better spent on startups."what startups would those be? tech startups? how about the gift kids who couldn't care less about tech? maybe they just want to become authors? who knows. startups?"Moreover, such programs increase the probability that you would pursue a career in academia, which generally leads to failure for the vast majority of people."define failure. failure to get into academia? misery at getting into academia?"Even picking a university major is an issue when certain fields such as mathematics are considered more respectable than others such as CS in such programs."what does a university major have to do with a gifted program in a high school?"Finally, the possibility of not even going to university is certainly not encouraged in such programs."other than vocational tech programs, where exactly is not going to university encouraged?--how about this, lets say you take away they gifted and talented program and put them back in standard college prep course work. how many did you think will get bored beyond belief by not being challenged? how well are they going to do? shouldn't you teach to level of each individual student rather than as a faceless homogenous mass?