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Risk and Resilience in Gifted Young People from Low Socio-Economic Backgrounds

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Giftedness and Talent

Abstract

Gifted and talented young people from low socio-economic backgrounds are consistently under-represented in gifted programmes in New Zealand schools. This chapter reports on a qualitative study that explored the lived experiences of 101 gifted New Zealand young people from low socio-economic backgrounds. An overarching question for this study was ‘What is it about gifted young people from low socio-economic backgrounds who have achieved to exceptional levels, that has enabled them to do so?’ The risk and resilience construct was used as a lens through which to explore their experiences across a range of contexts. These young people reflected on their perceptions of their giftedness and socio-economic circumstances, their childhoods and school experiences, and their home lives. The stories of the participants in this study indicated that there are particular risks associated with both giftedness and low socio-economic status, and contribute to ideas about how these young people might be more effectively supported to develop their potential.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    While New Zealand does not have an official poverty measure, a measure for poverty commonly used in official reports in New Zealand is a household equivalent disposable income set at 60% of the median, after adjusting for housing costs (Boston, 2014; Simpson et al., 2016).

  2. 2.

    A school’s decile rating indicates the proportion of its students that come from low socio-economic communities (Ministry of Education, 2008b). Schools are ranked from decile 1 to decile 10, with decile 1 schools drawing the highest proportion of students from low socio-economic communities. At the time of writing, a proposal has been made by the New Zealand government to remove the decile rating system in New Zealand in favour of another school funding mechanism.

  3. 3.

    A number of Pacific nations were represented in the survey, predominantly by Samoan, Tongan, Cook Island, Fijian, and Niuean individuals.

  4. 4.

    The discrepancy in numbers here reflects the opportunity for participants to select all ethnicities that they identified with. Other ethnicities represented amongst survey participants included Indian, Chinese, Vietnamese, Australian, and Latin American.

  5. 5.

    Participants were also able to nominate more than one area of talent if this was applicable. The total number of responses here indicates that most participants selected more than one talent area.

  6. 6.

    For a more extensive discussion of the risk and protective factors and processes identified in this model, please see the original thesis (Ballam, 2013).

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  1. University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand

    Nadine Ballam

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  1. Faculty of Education, University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand

    Nadine Ballam

  2. Faculty of Education, University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand

    Roger Moltzen

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Ballam, N. (2017). Risk and Resilience in Gifted Young People from Low Socio-Economic Backgrounds. In: Ballam, N., Moltzen, R. (eds) Giftedness and Talent. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-6701-3_2

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