Special Education Status and Underidentification of Twice-Exceptional Students: Insights from ECLS-K Data

The current study examined the underidentification of students with disabilities for gifted education programs, otherwise referred to as twice-exceptional students. This study utilized data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study Kindergarten Class of 2010–2011 (ECLS-K). We estimated that approximately 17% to 18% more students with disabilities should have been identified for a gifted education program as having statistically similar achievement scores to those students without disabilities in gifted education programs. Alternatively stated, students with disabilities should make up 10.8% of gifted programs, or about 1 in 9 students in gifted programs should be twice-exceptional. Students with disabilities who were male, non-White, low-income, and indicating more internalizing problem behaviors were more likely to not be identified for a gifted education program despite having similar achievement scores.