Mini-.

- In ES I underachieved; considered holding me back

- In MS, ADHD abruptly shot me to ‘most intelligent in all classes’; placed in gifted

- Life broke, barely passed 7th & 8th

- A SpEd for “problem children” in HS; treated as both an utter moron & fantastically smart

The thing missing from gifted program discourse is that *they wanted you to hate each other*

The entire system was set up so you’d fight

Every fucking level of the Ed system in the US deserves to be thoroughly torn apart

Treating gifted burn-outs as Just Whining, or reg students as Just Jealous, ignores that this was not fucking healthy for any of you

Treating each other as enemies is residual brain washing

You all suffer from a frankly stupid & unnecessary amount of trauma bc the goal of gifted programs—to shame worse-off kids into Being Better, & pressure “the good ones” into holding up the entire school’s budget thru high test scores—DIDN’T FUCKING WORK

Just

Going after ex-gifted is the same as “kids who grow up in wealthy families always benefited from family access to wealth”, *which is only true until you factor in increased vulnerability to abuse from those who KNOW they can get away w/ anything bc they control everything*

All of you got fucked over & need to stop pretending a special label or program could inherently protect you from harm.