The students from both coastal and inland areas will spend the day sharpening their talents with university lecturers, students, staff from district schools and other volunteers during a range of workshop events from creating Cryptic Crosswords to West African Drumming, making adhesives from household chemicals and milk, playing brain games, cutting up DNA, digging Up a Mystery, Debating, Maths problem solving and a host of other topics. We target kids with potential to perform within the top 10 percent in their given interest area regardless of their age, he said. Some of them are relatively isolated and can feel a bit different from their peer age group. The day at university is reassuring for them.
Some kids come from small schools in small towns and tend to hide their talents.
We encourage them not to pretend anymore but enjoy being who they are and make the most of the gifts they have been given. In fact the pressure is on us to provide another day each year, Mr Bailey said. During TED this year seminars will be held for parents to discuss issues such as the academic acceleration of brighter children, under-performance and ways to encourage the young people to handle their talents with confidence. There have been trials to provide mentors for gifted children in rural areas and this can be maintained through email, Mr Bailey said. We also find during the TEDs there are many parents and children who have never been on a university campus before.