Admissions Interested students and parents will undergo an intensive five-step admissions process to get into the School for the Exceptionally Gifted.
"We need to make sure that this is an ideal fit and environment," Minnetonka High Potential Services coordinator Mike Postma told the school board. "This is a feeling-out process between us and potential students to make sure that they will be successful in the program."
First, the district will hold a series of informational meetings at elementary schools later this month. Interested families will submit applications and work portfolios by March 6.
Next, a committee will interview parents and students. Then each student will be assessed using the WISC IV standardized test to make sure his or her IQ is approximately 145 or higher. Finally, a committee will review all materials to determine if there's a good fit. There will be opportunities for reconsideration, as well. Students for the school could be identified as early as May.
Location, transportation
The school will be located in two classrooms -- one each at Excelsior Elementary and Scenic Heights Elementary. Both buildings have the necessary space and facilities to accommodate the program, including enough space should the program expand to include younger students.
The buildings are located centrally in the eastern and western parts of the district and provide easy access to parents in other parts of the district, Postma said. Eventually, the schools will feed the district's two middle schools.
Transportation, which had the potential of becoming the greatest additional cost, will be provided only for students who already live in the attendance areas of the two elementary schools. Other students must arrange transportation or get dropped off at an existing bus route to the schools.
