The Friday before the start of the new school year in NE Denver was a busy time for dropping off supplies, checking classroom lists, and sharing summer stories.

After a lengthy application process, Denver Public Schools (DPS) has selected Isabella Bird Community School as a magnet site for highly gifted and talented (HGT) students. The Central Park elementary school will continue to serve as a community school, even as it reserves seats in each classroom for students throughout the district who have been identified as HGT.

“Especially since we have been offering intentional support to our gifted students for years, we are thrilled to become a formal magnet program,” said principal Rebecca Mercer. Isabella Bird was one of four schools in DPS to receive magnet status this year, the first time in more than a decade that magnet sites for HGT students have been added within the district.

Parents and students drop off school supplies and look for their names on class lists.

Students are generally identified as eligible for a magnet program if they score 95 percent or higher on a nationally normed cognitive test. Within DPS, universal screening is offered in the fall, and parents of rising kindergartners may request advance testing. During the school choice process, families of those who qualify for a magnet school will be able to apply for a HGT seat at Isabella Bird.

In 2016, Mercer, then a special needs and gifted education teacher at Isabella Bird, traveled to Arizona to dig deeply into the “research-based schoolwide cluster model” that has revolutionized gifted education. “In the cluster model, students are clustered together with their peers in classrooms instead of being pulled out of class a few hours a week, which can be very disruptive,” she explained. “Gifted kids are gifted all day long.”

Principal Rebecca Mercer talks to a family prior to the start of school.

Parents have gravitated to the cluster model, which has been proven to “lift every student up,” Mercer noted. Ashley Williams, an Isabella Bird mom who serves as president of the school’s Parent Teacher Community Organization, said of her two children, “My students have different strengths and weaknesses, but they both have really thrived at the school. It is a testament to Izzy B.’s commitment to well-rounded support, an approach that serves all students and is intentionally inclusive.” In fact, for Williams, the “beauty of our school is that diverse learners are celebrated.”

Ashley Williams, Parent Teacher Community Organization president, greets a new student.

The school’s  commitment to inclusivity includes providing tailored support to twice exceptional students, or students who might have a disability that masks their giftedness. “The myth is that gifted students are simply high-performing and high-achieving,” Mercer said. “Gifted learners are vulnerable learners with unique social and emotional needs.” Isabella Bird weaves social and emotional learning throughout the curricula, and the school psychologists offer support that targets challenges common to gifted learners, such as emotional intensity, perfectionism, and anxiety.

The 2025–26 school year is a planning period for new DPS magnet sites, with programs officially kicking off in the fall of 2026. Dr. Meryl Faulkner, director of the DPS Gifted and Talented Department, said, “We are launching these new programs with purpose, equity, and long-term planning.”

With their updated status as a magnet school, Isabella Bird “will do what we’ve been doing while always aiming to improve and grow,” Mercer said. Each teacher holds or will complete their gifted education certification this school year, and as a magnet school, Mercer and her team will have the opportunity to collaborate with other GT sites within the district. For families, the school’s magnet status will expand access to gifted education. “Our goal is to take what we find to be the most successful and equitable way to do gifted education and then extend and refine what we’re doing,” Mercer said.

The other DPS schools that were recently named magnet sites for HGT students are Beach Court Elementary, Carson Elementary, and Florida Pitt Waller ECE–8.

Front Porch photos by Christie Gosch