Historical Background

Rider 69 of the 76th Texas Legislature states:

It is the intent of the Legislature that the Texas Education Agency develop an assessment system and statewide standards for gifted/talented students at all grade levels. TEA was awarded $277,250 in each year of the last three biennia to develop such a system and pilot standards for the performance of gifted/talented students in the areas of mathematics, science, social studies, and language arts for Grade 4, Grade 8, and the exit level. School district participation in the project or the use of the standards is voluntary.

With Rider 69, enacted in 1999 and reinstated in the following two legislative sessions, the Texas Legislature directed the Texas Education Agency to develop an assessment system and statewide standards for gifted/talented students at all grade levels. The work began with the 2000-02 Performance Standards Pilot, an initial effort to develop statewide standards and an accompanying assessment system to capture the high levels of achievement exhibited by exit level gifted/talented students in the areas of English language arts, mathematics, social studies, and science. In addition to providing information on an individual student's learning, the results of this assessment can be aggregated to provide data that may be used to improve a school's or district's efforts to serve gifted/talented students. The exit level TPSP is now being used on a voluntary basis statewide.

Development of the Grade 8 TPSP began in 2001-02 when a working committee of Texas middle school educators drafted performance standards, the guidelines for the development of student projects, and the overall design of the 2001-02 pre-pilot. A committee of national specialists in gifted/talented education reviewed the results of 2001-02 pre-pilot, and a decision was made to continue the pilot with revised project guidelines in the 2002-03 school year. In 2002-03, scoring criteria, scoring guides, and tasks were created. These tasks were piloted during the 2002-03 school year. The scoring system was tested in the summer of 2003. The Grade 8 TPSP underwent limited implementation in 2003-04. It is now being used statewide on a voluntary basis.

During the 2002-03 school year, the TPSP was expanded to include Grade 4. Five tasks were developed and field tested in schools and districts across the state. A scoring system was also developed and tested during the summer of 2003. In the 2003-04 school year, the original pilot sites field tested the tasks with revisions based on the previous year's pilot. The Grade 4 TPSP began limited implementation in the 2004-05 school year and is currently in statewide voluntary implementation.