Your point about government subsidy is on the mark, but why are the kids at the bottom subsidised while those at the top are left to languish? It illustrates a double standard that has somehow become embedded in the culture of the country. If Americans truly believed in giving each child their fair share, then politics would force the resources to be spread more evenly.
What has bothered me the most, time and again, is the assumption that smart kids will 'turn out fine' without additional challenges and, by contrast, there's any reasonable ROI expectation with the a large portion of developmentally challenged / mentally deficient kids. It's a sensitive issue for sure. Somehow just postulating this kind of thinking draws up feelings of insensitivity, but I'm trying to focus on some empirical observations. Difficult tight rope!
If you do that, you basically just dumped a bunch of money into kids that are immediatley leaving for somewhere else. It's like global warming; why cut emissions for someone else's benefit compared to your own?
Economically speaking, gifted students ...If there's a sensible read of someone's comment it's preferable to use that interpretation. "Economically gifted" makes no sense in the context of the discussion.
The OP was saying your tax dollars are likely to get a good return by fostering the progress of gifted students.
Keeping all the smart kids locked in an ivory tower where they don't have to deal with humanity or ever get any context into how society actually works is how you get Ayn Rand afficionados well past the age-appropriate teenage years, and nobody wants that.
Of course, people complain about negative effects on the remaining schools [0] on the basis that removing gifted students hurts the remaining ones. This seems like a strange concern to me -- why should gifted students be responsible for pulling up their peers?
[0] http://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/10/magnet-schools-m...
Some variant of academic socialism?
Could it be packaged with social socialism for the gifted kids who lack in other social areas?
Unless you have a special gifted program, that's generally only true in high school and maybe middle school, and (even then), is subject to the availability of distinct "upper level" classes, which even in high schools may be limited in districts where the effort is focused on maintaining the middle and bringing up the bottom.
The author's thesis is that the real benefit, to average and gifted kids alike, is not having to be in the same class as the bottom rung of kids.
I find that thesis at least plausible. I went to regular public school for K-8, then a magnet school for 9-12. It's really the bottom 10%, usually kids with behavioral or social problems, that makes the experience worse for everyone.
At the same time, I'm not sure my magnet school experience would've been appreciably worse with a bunch of average kids in the class. Maybe the teachers would have had to teach the material more slowly and we would've covered less of it, but the fact is that very little you learn in K-12 matters anyway.
And herein lies the problem with K-12 for gifted students. Why should kids be learning things that don't matter when they are capable of more?
(Note: I disagree with the claim that little in K12 matters; every bit of knowledge lays the foundation for the next layer of abstraction. E.g. counting->arithmetic->algebra->calculus/statistics, or alphabet->spelling->vocabulary->grammar->reading->writing->essay writing/research.)
I disagree. Most of what is learned in K-12 is foundational for things learned later (literacy, numeracy, and basic social skills at the earlier grades, more developed hard and soft analytical and communications skills in later grades.) Even to the extent that the nominal subject matter may not be particularly generally useful later, it tends to serve as a focus for more generally applicable skills.
Also, the argument isn't that gifted students are responsible for pulling up peers. The argument is that by being around people like that, it benefits others. Much like integrating schools and having different income levels in the same school helps others.
But, yes, there's a lot of government policy at all levels that favors focussing on the low end and ignoring the high end of the ability scale -- that's exactly the thing that seems to be the focus of the complaint. So saying that the thing being complained about makes sense because of the exact thing being complained about is, somewhat circular logic.
"How many students will use a gifted program?" Approximately 6 to 10% are gifted
"They will require dedicated teachers and staff, and their own curriculum." Not necessarily. They may (depending on levels of giftedness); however, differentiation and what not are also acceptable approaches in some cases.