Center for Talent Development

The Center for Talent Development (CTD) is a center within the School of Education and Social Policy at Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois. It is one of four regionally based centers providing services to gifted children based on the talent search model developed by Julian Stanley at Johns Hopkins University. The CTD is one of the largest providers of services to gifted children and their families in the Midwest and in the country.

The CTD began in 1982 as the Midwest Academic Talent Search and became a Center in 1984. It is accredited, since 1994, by the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools (NCA) as a special function school for the gifted. The model consists of above-grade-level testing and assessment of gifted students' abilities through the use of tests such as the ACT and SAT with middle school–aged children. Other similar centers exist at Johns Hopkins University (the Center for Talented Youth), Duke University (the Talent Identification Program), and the University of Denver (the Rocky Mountain Talent Search). The mission of CTD is to serve academically talented children and their families throughout the Midwest and the entire United States and to provide leadership to schools and the educational community regarding gifted education.

A basic premise underlying CTD's work is that children should be given educational experiences that match their abilities, interests, and readiness to learn and not based solely on their chronological age or grade in school. A major focus of CTD is to develop innovative program models that serve gifted students in a variety of venues (e.g., summer programs, distance learning) and that meet their developmental, social-emotional, and educational needs. Current services at CTD include the Midwest Academic Talent Search, which involves 31,000 students annually in Grades 3 through 9; the Saturday Enrichment Program, which involves 2,400 students annually at three sites in the Chicago area; the Gifted Learning Links distance education program, which involves more than 1,000 students in Grades 3 though 12 in online courses; four summer programs (Leapfrog for Grades preK through 3, Apogee for Grades 4–6, Spectrum for Grades 6–9, Equinox for Grades 9–12) that involve more than 3,000 students annually; a program of parent education consisting of seminars on Saturdays and an annual family conference in the summer; seminars and workshops for educators; a master's program in gifted education; the Civic Education Program, which combines service learning with classroom exploration of social issues and involves 200 students annually in the summer Civic Leadership Institute and 125 students in the academic year Civic Week program; Project EXCITE, which serves underrepresented gifted students in elementary and middle school to prepare them for advanced tracks in high school; and other grant-funded projects that serve primarily underserved gifted students, either low-income or minority or both. The Center's accreditation with NCA enables it to offer high school credit for high school–level courses offered throughout its various programs. The CTD has a strong program of research that focuses on assessing the effectiveness and transferability of various program models, such as the fast-paced model that [Page 125]underlies some of the summer program classes or model for identifying and serving underrepresented minority gifted students in Project EXCITE.

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