Pea Ridge Gifted & Talented earns award

Pea Ridge and Springdale school districts won awards this month for outstanding gifted education programs at the Arkansans for Gifted and Talented Education conference in Hot Springs.

Pea Ridge School, with 1,930 students, received the award for midsize districts. Springdale, with 21,260 students, won the award for large school districts. The 600-student McCrory School District in east Arkansas won for small districts.

Awards for the top programs are given annually by the Governor’s Advisory Council for the Education of Gifted and Talented Children. The awards come with $3,000 prizes, according to the Arkansas Department of Education.

Gifted children operate at a high level, have constant questions and feel pressure from expectations they place on themselves and expectations they think others have for them, said Kathy Hall, the gifted and talented coordinator for Pea Ridge. Those pressures sometimes lead to emotional issues when they need help learning to balance those expectations with reality.

“You can’t always do it all,” Hall said she tells them. “You can’t be perfect. Sometimes you’re going to fail. Sometimes you’re go- ing to fall short. It’s OK.”

Pea Ridge last year added a second gifted educator who is now a full-time employee, Hall said. The addition allows the district to better meet the needs of students. Hall works directly with students in third through fifth grade and in high school, while John Gibson focuses on sixth through eighth grade.

Highlights of Pea Ridge services for gifted children include gifted instruction for all children in kindergarten through second grade, separate enrichment classes for children in the third through fifth grades and choices of study for students in sixth through eighth grades, Hall said.

High school students are served not only through pre-Advanced Placement and Advanced Placement courses, but gifted high school students meet monthly with Hall, she said. Each year Hall takes groups of high school students on field trips to different colleges. She also makes appointments for them to meet with professors in fields they want to study.

School districts at a minimum must identify at least 5 percent of students for gifted services, but Springdale’s program reaches close to 10 percent, or 1,965 children in first through 12th grade, said Jo Vanderspikken, the district’s gifted and talented program coordinator.