Are We Failing Our Geniuses?

In U.S. schools, the highest achievers are too often challenged the least. Why that's hurting America — and how to fix it

Nancy Newberry for TIME

Claire Evans, 12, attends Reno's Davidson Academy.

Any sensible culture would know what to do with Annalisee Brasil. The 14-year-old not only has the looks of a South American model but is also one of the brightest kids of her generation. When Annalisee was 3, her mother Angi Brasil noticed that she was stringing together word cards composed not simply into short phrases but into complete, grammatically correct sentences. After the girl turned 6, her mother took her for an IQ test. Annalisee found the exercises so easy that she played jokes on the testers--in one case she not only put blocks in the correct order but did...

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