The Winchester Public Schools K-12 Gifted (EXCEL) program emphasizes EXcellence, Creativity, Enrichment, and Leadership. Appropriate learning pathways are provided to gifted students through a continuum of services and options. Learning opportunities are designed to be open-ended so that they may be tailored to the talents and interests of students. The goal is to engage students in comprehensive study for which the rate of learning, content, and high level processing skills are adjusted to provide an individualized program commensurate with the needs of each intellectually gifted student.

Teachers are trained to look for gifted characteristics in all students, but students may also be referred to the EXCEL program by parents, community members, professional school staff, student self nomination, or peer nomination. All 2nd grade students will be assessed using a universal screener in the Winter of 2017/2018.

WPS invites referrals for gifted identification two times a year. Submission dates for the 2019-2020 school year are as follows:

FALL: Grades 3-12 - Referrals submitted September 3 - September 13, 2019
WINTER: Grades 2-12 - Referrals submitted January 27 - February 7, 2020

Download the Gifted Referral Form or contact your child's teacher. 

Our universal screener for all 2nd grade students will be during the first two weeks of February.