Our Program Plan

IBCS meets the needs of gifted and advanced students through a full-time programming model called School-Wide Cluster Grouping. This research-based strategy attends to the academic and social/emotional needs of gifted learners. This model places a group, or cluster, of GT students into a classroom with a teacher who has training and experience in meeting the needs of this diverse group of learners. Research is clear that gifted students benefit from time with intellectual and like-minded peers. 

We have expanded our program to meet increased demand and have at least two gifted clusters at each grade level. We currently have five staff members who are highly qualified to teach gifted students and the rest of our teaching staff is almost certified or working towards certification. 

Our GT Support Teachers and Instructional Coach  support the cluster model through testing and identification, planning, and by offering extensions and resources to our teachers. In addition, they facilitate professional development for teachers and  coach teachers in differentiation and planning for their gifted learners.

IBCS is committed to addressing the ongoing disproportionality in gifted education by actively seeking to offer equitable GT programming for our underserved populations. We accomplish this by intentionally placing students into the GT cluster classrooms through the lens of equity. We also actively seek to identify students from diverse backgrounds by encouraging participation in testing, universally screening all students in K and 2nd grade, sharing characteristics of giftedness in CLED (culturally, linguistically, and economically diverse) populations with teachers, and advocating for equitable identification practices at the state and national level. Our goal is to have our GT programming reflect the population of students that we serve and become a model for equitable access to GT programming.