Top 10 Reasons Why You Should Take the EAP Spot by Austina De Bonte, longtime EAP & AAP parent 1. If your kid qualified, they are ready academically. The qualification criteria are high. If your kid passed the bar, they will do fine. In fact, we see plenty of kids who really SHOULD qualify and would benefit tremendously from an EAP classroom, but for one reason or another can’t seem to pass the district test. (If this is your kid, or perhaps a sibling, please reach out – there may be a hidden learning disability at play that can be quite difficult to suss out in a high IQ kid because they can compensate so well. It’s worth figuring this out while they are still young and therapies are more effective. Vision processing issues are a huge hidden culprit – covd.org) 2. Everyone needs to find their tribe. The academic benefits are obvious, but the surprise for everyone is how good of a fit EAP is socially. Whether your kid is a social butterfly in their home school, or whether they have struggled to make friends, both kids (and parents!) are surprised at how much they have in common with other EAP kids (and parents!). EAP kids say that the other kids "get me," which many have never experienced before, and once they experience it, they don’t want to go back. Whether it’s playing quirky, imaginative, involved games on the playground, telling abstract jokes, using advanced vocabulary in everyday conversation, or getting deep into a debate in the classroom, these kids don’t need to hide who they are to fit right in. 3. Transportation, for real. We are super excited that starting next year the district will be providing full transportation for all EAP (and AAP) students attending their assigned school. By far this has been the biggest complaint about EAP in the past, and we are exceptionally lucky to have a district who has committed to fixing this. Your student will be able to walk from their house to a bus stop, and a bus will take them to their assigned EAP school. While we don’t know exactly how that will work, we do know that the HiCap Office is spending a lot of time on this lately, strategizing with the Transportation department on how to keep the ride times reasonable. 4. Do the math double jump early, not late. EAP is by far the easiest and kindest way for a kid to get on the double jump math path. Yes, kids can test in 6th grade for double jump math, and about 100 kids succeed in doing so across the district—but that means those kids are going to go straight from 6th grade math to algebra (skipping both 7th and 8th grade math). Yes, kids do it, and yes, most are successful, but that’s a BIG jump. In comparison, an EAP kid jumps ahead only one year (usually skipping 2nd or 3rd grade math), and the EAP program compacts 5th and 6th grade math into one year, so EAP kids actually don’t “miss” much of anything in math, and when they get to 7th grade, algebra is just the next step on their math path and they continue on automatically, no testing required. Even kids who enter EAP later in 4th or 5th grade have way more support from EAP teachers to catch up than they would by leaping into algebra in 7th. Practically speaking, kids make the math transition really well, and no, you don’t need to spend the summer prepping them. The teachers will take care of it. (If you want to do some prep anyway, try KhanAcademy.com) 5. Advanced, accelerated curriculum that goes deeper. Not only do EAP kids accelerate in math, but they also get accelerated a year in the reading curriculum. Teachers are trained to use Socratic dialog with their classes, as well as Junior Great Books in the upper EAP grades. EAP science and social studies topics are the same grade level topics, but they tend to go into greater depth, and the students themselves create deeper discussions and investigations in whatever topic they are working on through their own curiosity. In comparison, except in individual, exceptional cases for math, in-school HiCap does not typically accelerate at all. Rather, the in-school HiCap program is intended to differentiate to go deeper and provide more enrichment/depth instead of acceleration. How effectively this is done seems to vary tremendously by school/teacher, and we have heard a lot of frustration about in-school HiCap over the years. By the way, the EAP homework load is not high – by design. The goal is not more work – but different work. You’ll find EAP homework very similar in volume to homework at your neighborhood school.

6. Teachers who understand these kids. EAP teachers get special training in the needs of HiCap kids – including academics, but also social and emotional needs. HiCap kids are sensitive, intense, perfectionistic, fidgety—and it’s not totally unusual to shed a tear from frustration even as late as 5th grade. This is not a social stigma in the EAP classes, btw, because all of these kids have many of those intensities, even though not all show it the same way. Many of the EAP teachers have HiCap kids themselves who have gone through the EAP program. Social and emotional coaching is an integral part of many EAP classrooms. So is greater support in learning executive function skills like keeping an agenda, time management, breaking down large projects, etc. which often lags in this population (the neuroscience here is fascinating). 7. EAP is not full of behavior problems. I’m not sure where this rumor got started, but for years I’ve heard uninformed parents talk about EAP classrooms as full of behavior problem kids that distract each other, can’t get their work done, and are total misfits. Yes, there can be a couple kids in EAP classrooms that need more support, but frankly, this is typically a reality in every classroom. The difference is that EAP teachers receive more training and have more understanding about how to support all kids and so things tend to go more smoothly all around. Also, when HiCap kids’ brains are being challenged, the problem behaviors that may have occurred at their old school usually recede or may even go away entirely once they are in EAP. When I volunteer, I see quiet classrooms, respectful kids, fun shared experiences, and lively participation in classroom discussions. When it’s time for sustained silent reading, you could hear a pin drop. I wish this myth would finally die. 8. Prevent middle school underachievement by providing genuine challenge in elementary school. Many kids new to EAP have an adjustment period the first month or two where they experience actual challenge at school for the very first time – ideas, topics, and work that does not come naturally or intuitively for them. You want your kid to learn how to deal with challenge as early as possible, when you can more effectively coach them and help them over the bumps. Kids who never have the opportunity to develop these critical emotional coping skills, persistence, picking yourself up and trying again, time management, study skills, etc. are at huge risk for underachievement and other issues in middle school or high school when they finally encounter subjects that are not intuitive for them. Underchallenged kids can easily develop the belief that being smart means everything will always be easy for them. When they are eventually faced with a situation where it doesn’t come easy, and they really have to buckle down to be successful, they may have an identity crisis – “Uh oh, this isn’t easy, so I must not be smart after all.” Sadly, not all kids rise to the challenge – the underachievement rate in our population is high. I counsel many parents whose middle schoolers or high schoolers stopped engaging at school, skate by with C’s, yet clearly are capable of so much more – and were straight A elementary students. We are not doing our kids any favors long term by letting school be “easy” for them. The foundation of these crucial life skills is built in the elementary years; the longer you wait for your kid to experience challenge at school, the harder it will be for your kid in the long run. 9. Yes, EAP is even for 2e kids with a 504 or IEP. A HiCap kid can also have a learning disability (called “twice exceptional” or 2e) and may already have a 504 plan or IEP in place to support their needs, or may need to get one in the future. There are a handful of 2e kids in every EAP classroom, and the teachers do a great job supporting them while also challenging them at their appropriate level academically. A learning disability or other special need is not a reason to stay out of EAP. In fact, being in EAP may even speed discovery of an underlying disability. When school material is actually challenging, disabilities become more noticeable. Just like for any kid, early intervention for disabilities is more effective – the trick is realizing it’s there. HiCap kids can compensate for disabilities so well that parents and teachers can sometimes be completely unaware – until eventually the work gets hard enough and the student hits a brick wall, usually in middle or high school, and sometimes not until college. 10. Changing schools isn’t as hard as you think. The social transition of changing schools can be a big concern for kids and families - leaving friends, making new ones. For some reason, families of girls seem to have particularly strong concerns about leaving friends behind, especially if the girl has struggled socially in the past, but also if

the girl has developed a strong network of friends that are hard to leave. If everyone accepted the EAP spot, most EAP classrooms would actually have a bit more girls than boys, but when it all shakes out, the split ends up being pretty even, sometimes just slightly higher with boys. It is particularly vexing for me that in this day and age some families will prioritize an appropriate school environment for their boys, but not for their girls. Especially when the truth is that the EAP social environment can be great for girls, welcoming and inclusive, with less focus on fashion, cliques, and the subtle ways that “mean girls” exclude each other. The EAP kids are a great group, and the teachers do a great job at folding new kids in and helping them connect socially. In fact, most kids, girls and boys, do BETTER socially in EAP than they did in their old school, because they finally found their “tribe.” The HiCap parent advisory board plans several events over the summer to help you get to know your new classmates long before school even starts, schedule playdates, find classmates who live near you, and get class contact lists over the summer. Participating in these events goes a long way to easing the anxiety. The hardest part of changing schools is often for the parents to make new friends—not the kids. The answer to that is easy: join the PTA, volunteer, get involved. Just because the EAP school isn’t your neighborhood school doesn’t mean you can’t be PTA president, run the chess club, or bring over a great new idea from your old school. Jump right in, and welcome!