Less-Biased Aptitude Test Approved : S.D. Schools Seek More Minorities for Gifted Programs

A test to measure mental ability that shows less bias toward minorities was tentatively approved by the San Diego city school board Tuesday for use in screening students for the gifted and talented education program.

The test, known as DCAT, will replace another intelligence test that has been used for years but which officials believe fails to identify all potentially qualified students, in particular minority students, for the special program. (The tests, traditionally known as IQ tests, also are called aptitude or ability tests, and psychologists use the labels interchangeably.)

The small number of minority students in the high-powered gifted program, known as GATE, has been a source of concern to San Diego Unified School District officials for several years. Intense efforts by teachers and counselors to identify such students has dropped the percentage of white and non-white new GATE students from 80% white and 20% non-white to 65-35 recently.

Search for Students

But board members were told Tuesday that the GATE program still has difficulty in finding gifted minority students, especially those who are not already achieving well in regular classes for whatever reasons. The ability tests are used for initial screenings, after which officials stress that they look at several aspects of an individual student’s record, including artistic talent and other measures. The GATE program includes about 8,000 students.

Most minority groups score lower on ability tests on the average than does the white population. A federal appeals court last year forbade California schools from using IQ tests to assess black students for special, or remedial, education courses because the court found such tests biased and invalid for such purposes. The court ruled against the San Francisco Unified School District for using the test as its sole criterion.

Because of the ongoing concern, the San Diego board last year authorized a pilot study using three intelligence tests to determine which could most broadly identify intellectual potential among the widest range of students.

In carrying out the study, officials followed a key assumption, now common among social scientists, that says that several factors are involved in in measuring intelligence. The traditional view of ability saw it as inherited and unchanging, and giftedness as synonymous with intelligence.

Acquired Aptitudes

“But the contemporary view now is that most of the aptitudes we thought of as given can be acquired, although there is no definitive analysis to show us where the limits (to what can be learned) are,” Stephen Isaac, director of the school district’s evaluation department. The department conducted the study, Isaac said in an interview.

“Basically, we look upon most of the aptitudes as teachable . . . that achievement now can modify and stretch ability, depending on a student’s motivation, socioeconomic opportunities, and other factors,” he said.

“For example, we used to say that recall of digits, where you read off a series of digits and the youngster recalls them to the limit that he can, was a given . . . but now it is seen as something that can be taught (to be expanded) through training and instruction.

“We say now that (an intelligence) test measures a combination of aptitude and achievement.”

The multiple skills now sought by psychologists in evaluating students for the GATE program were found to be best measured by the DCAT test, Isaac told the board. The DCAT includes several subtests, unlike the present test, which reports only a single overall score. Isaac said subtests are valuable in identifying students with particular skills who may have had difficulty comprehending some parts of the test because their first language is not English.

“DCAT appears to be less subject to factors favoring white students,” Isaac said. “DCAT emerges as an instrument with the most ethnically balanced outcome,” given the parameters of the pilot study. Few minority students identified as potentially gifted by DCAT were identified by the other two tests.

Isaac cautioned that each of the three tests has advantages and disadvantages.

“But given the role of multiple criteria in screening, an instrument that contributes to this broadened assessment by providing scores representing multiple skills will be beneficial,” Isaac said in recommending the test to the board.

Under board rules, the recommendation comes back next week for a final vote.