One year ago, Santa Barbara Unified parents ripped into the district over its plan to pull the plug on Washington Elementary’s self-contained, gifted-student classes and replace them with an integrated model that mixes the gifted kids into regular classrooms. The parents’ public protests were successful and the highly coveted program was saved — or so it seemed.
This year, only 11 of the children who were qualified signed up for the GATE (Gifted and Talented Education) program — not even half the amount required to form a class. The low enrollment is odd for the program, which is usually so popular that a lottery is required to decide which students make it in the Washington magnet model.
“My biggest question is how did we get here?” asked Washington father James Fenkner. “It just seems like a statistical anomaly.”