Southern Reap: Gifted and Talented Programme

Reap 2

The Southern REAP Gifted and Talented Education programme (GATE) is an education initiative that aims to provide special education opportunities to rural communities in Southland.

The programme is delivered in collaboration with local partners, including Iwi and Hapu, and focuses on improving the lives of people of all ages in rural provinces.

The GATE programme has a broad scope, covering early childhood education, schools and post-school/tertiary education. Kate McRae, part of the team at Southern REAP, oversees the schools and early childhood departments.

One of the key projects of the Southern REAP GATE programme involves facilitating clusters of rural schools in Southland to develop programmes that enhance the gifts and talents of high-ability children.

“There is a wide variety of needs we cater for, from art, music and dance, to robotics and science. If a child is gifted and talented in a certain area, that information is fed back to us, and as an organisation, we develop programmes best suited around those subjects and passions,” Kate said.

The need for the programme arose from the limited resources available in rural schools to provide high-quality gifted and talented programmes. Southern REAP coordinates and develops these programmes based on the needs of individual students, using the best available resources to maximise their talents and gifts.

Kate said the programme had been successful in meeting the needs of rural students and had positive feedback from schools and principals.

"The support from Community Trust South has been key to this programme's success. It's an expensive programme to run because we are employing tutors to teach specialised topics but we can involve the schools and whānau at a really reduced rate because of the Community Trust funding," she said.