The use of talent classes to reproduce differentiated education

Abstract

Talent and the development of talent have become increasingly dominant topics in the public sphere. Topics of talent also figure as important objectives for the education policies in Denmark, where various initiatives, including science centres for talents, annual talent camps and competitions, and not least resources and funding, are provided as part of this ‘new’ priority in education. This article examines, through an ethnographic approach of a talent class in a Danish secondary school, how the purpose of current educational policies focusing on talent are perceived and experienced. In addition to this analysis, the phenomena of establishing such classes as an integrated activity of ordinary schooling and of the labelling attached to being talented is discussed. The conclusion is that the use of the talent classes is a form of socially constructed differentiation with the cohort mainly constituted to those with cultural capital.

Keywords:

• talent development
• talent class
• secondary school
• educational differentiation
• talented pupils

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by a postdoc grant from the Danish Research Council for Independent Research, Social Sciences (Autumn 2006). I also thank Dennis Beach and the anonymous reviewers for helpful and constructive comments on the earlier drafts of this article.

Notes

1. Professor Palle Rasmussen took part in some of the interview activities and co-authored the background report of the study (Rasmussen and Rasmussen 2007).

2. In Denmark, education is compulsory for children between 7 and 16 years of age (primary and lower secondary education in the Folkeskole), while admission to general upper secondary education depends on the completion of the nine years of basic education, the fulfillment of certain subject requirements and application. Nearly all school-leavers continue in upper secondary education: about 41% in vocational colleges and 53% in schools providing general upper secondary education (mainly at the Gymnasiums). The aim of the Gymnasium is to provide general education as well as to prepare the students for continued studies. There is a core of obligatory subjects as well as some optional subjects, teachers must be university graduates at what corresponds to MA or MSc level and the Ministry of Education must approve all materials offered at the examinations.

3. The HTX is upper secondary schooling combining academic and technical curricula. It is a variant of the gymnasium (see note 2) and gives access to most university studies.