In Search of Excellence: Perceived effects of special classes for gifted students in Ireland from the perspective of the students and their parents

This thesis focuses on high ability students and the effects of Saturday and summer\ncourses on their academic and social development. These students who have been\nidentified through assessment are in the top 5% of the population academically. After\nqualifying from the assessment they are invited to participate in courses run by the\nIrish Centre for Talented Youth (CTYI) at Dublin City University and other colleges\naround the country.\nThis study looks at students who have participated on these programmes and their\nparents in relation to the impact of these courses on their academic and social\ndevelopment. Results show that participating students and their parents have a\nsignificantly higher level of academic satisfaction with classes at CTYI compared to\nschool. Furthermore the parents and students perceive themselves to have a more\npositive attitude towards attending CTYI classes compared to school. Both parents\nand students within this study note a lack of academic challenge at school and believe\nthat they receive little support from their classmates in relation to their ability. Parents\ntend to rank their children’s ability as much better than their peers in all academic\nsubjects while most of the students rank themselves as much better in selected\nsubjects. Students and parents within the study are mostly comfortable with their\nacademic ability although this is seen to decline slightly as the child gets older. Most\nof the parents and the students who have attended special classes for high ability\nchildren are somewhat uncomfortable with the term gifted to describe their ability.