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The Current Transcript for November 4, 2016

Host: Dave Seglins

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Listen to the full episode

Prologue

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SOUNDCLIP

I was in class and all of a sudden I hear screeching, like, a girl screaming for help and then a whole bunch of screams for ambulances. And I really can't forget about, like, hearing the screams in the hallways it's really, like, disturbing.

DAVE SEGLINS: A student at the Abbotsford, BC high school where a girl was stabbed to death in the halls this week. She can't forget what it was like to be there and hear it, but thousands more who were not there have nevertheless seen the vicious attack in a video that's circulating online. We're starting today with a discussion about that video, what seeing it and circulating it could mean for the witnesses and those close to the girl who died, and whether there's any return from this new world where anything that can be shared will be shared, posted online to go viral far and wide. Also today, what it's like to be an eight-year-old in a gifted class at school.

SOUNDCLIP

Well, it's not too easy or too hard. And there are lots of nice teachers that clearly understand us.

DS: But those gifted classes might be on their way out. Critics say gifted kids belong in regular classrooms, the gifted classes are elitist. Some research even suggest students in gifted classes do just as well when they're mixed in with everyone else. We'll hear arguments for and against, and more from that young man too in half an hour. Also today..

SOUNDCLIP

I forgave Mark Stroman many years ago I think about him waiting in a cell to be executed and can feel the pain of how ignorance can be driven by such hate.

DS: The man he forgave once attempted to murder him as a hate crime in cold blood. How a shooting victim got to his place of forgiveness and even fought tooth and nail to have his would-be killer removed from death row. It is a remarkable story and we'll hear it in about an hour. I'm Dave Seglins, and this is the Friday edition of The Current.

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Abbotsford school stabbing video raises questions about sharing raw footage online

Guests: Danielle Law, Lisa Lynch, Peter Chow-White

DAVE SEGLINS: Soon after a deadly stabbing at an Abbotsford, BC high school this week, the superintendent of schools Kevin Godden addressed the news media. He praised the school staff for stopping the attacker and locking down the school. He assured the community that the incident appeared to be a random act of violence. And he made this impassioned plea.

SOUNDCLIP

Out of respect for the families, I ask that you immediately cease circulation of the viral video that was filmed during this incident yesterday. This video is a trigger to trauma not only for our students and our community, but for any person that has been involved in a traumatic incident.

DS: Yes, that stabbing attack that killed 13-year-old Letisha Reimer was caught on camera and instantly uploaded and circulated online. The suspect has been apprehended charged with second degree murder and aggravated assault. Of course, it's much harder today to stop a video that's gone viral. Here are students Shawn Roufosse and Baljot Rai.

SOUNDCLIP

SHAWN ROUFOSSE: Going on Facebook right after school, you see it's everywhere and people are posting it and people are sharing it. And the last thing I want to do is relive it and it's just the same scream that brings you back to that situation.

BALJOT RAI: I feel like the fact that that video was released and some of our parents saw it before they could find out if we were ok is, like, inhumane, like.

SHAWN ROUFOSSE: And it was bad enough being on Snapchat and Facebook when the school was in lockdown and kids seeing it while the school was in lockdown and getting all freaked out. But then seeing it again and again is just taxing on all people.

BALJOT RAI: We don’t want to relive, like, I just want to pretend it didn't happen, but it did. And I don't want to relive what I just went through. It's something that's going to be with me the rest of my life, and like, the fact that there's like a video of it, I don't want to see it and I wish no one else would see it.

DS: Students Shawn Roufosse and Baljot Rai. Danielle Law is an Assistant Professor of Psychology and Youth and Children's Studies at Wilfrid Laurier University. And she joins us from Brantford, Ontario. Hello.

DANIELLE LAW: Hi there.

DS: Well, we heard the students from Abbotsford Senior Secondary School talking about their reactions. What effect can a raw video like this have on young people who were there and who actually knew the victim?

DANIELLE LAW: Mmhmm. Yeah, this is a very sensitive issue and I think we have to remember that it's not entertainment and I think oftentimes when we're posting videos like this, it can trivialize the sensitivity and the seriousness of this. And for those individuals who were there and the young people who were there in the school to have to see it over and over, it retriggers that trauma and retriggers that occurrence, and they're already going through a lot of trauma. And I think it's something that we have to be very considerate about when we're posting videos like this.

DS: Now, I'm in Toronto, far far away, don't know the victims. I mean, what kind of effect can it have on other young people who don't even know the victim?

DANIELLE LAW: It can have a large effect. I mean, we're looking at social media, we're looking at an event that is very serious, that has happened in a school and it can create a lot of fear. A lot of fear among students, a lot of fear among parents, a lot of fear among people in general in the community, because it was so random and unpredictable. And to continue to see this over and over again can perpetuate this idea of danger. And this is a unique situation. This is not something that happens all the time and to continue to see it over and over can create a lot of fear around something we don't really have control over.

DS: Have you seen it?

DANIELLE LAW: I have seen the video, yes.

DS: And what do you make of it?

DANIELLE LAW: It's horrifying. It's absolutely horrifying and it sticks with you. I was not there, I am also in the Toronto area and I live in Bradford. But even I couldn't sleep last night thinking about it. And I was not there, I'm across the country. And so to think about the families involved, the students involved, the staff, the teachers, everyone in that school who was there, to continually relive it because it's online. I can't even imagine what that must be like.

DS: Well, it sparked much debate and we want to examine, you know, the whys of it being posted and being consumed. Do you think this video should have gone online at all?

DANIELLE LAW: No. I don't think it should have got online at all. I think, I'm not sure why it went online but we have a tendency to post everything online often without thinking and there's no purpose in it being online. I think we really have to be mindful of our actions and be mindful of how our actions and decisions affect other people. And when we post something like this where there is no real purpose behind it, it can be quite traumatizing. And this is something that we have to really talk seriously with the community and with people and with students about what is appropriate to put online and how can we be more thoughtful when we are posting things.

DS: But what about the viewer? I mean, what compels us to watch a video like this?

DANIELLE LAW: A lot of it is curiousity. We're curious to see what happens. A lot of times, I mean, it's kind of like if there's a horrible car accident and you're driving by and you don't want to look at it but were compelled to look at it. And there's just something about these kinds of horrific situations where we need to see it to believe it almost.

DS: Is there not some value in this though? Isn't this sort of validating, and just a testament or a witness to albeit a very horrible event that happened at this school?

DANIELLE LAW: I'm not really sure how this could be a positive thing. I know that there are times where horrific things are shown to portray injustice and to portray how we need to do something and take action, and horrible things are happening so we must take action toward creating peace or equality and addressing those unjust situations. But in this case we’re not trying to proclaim anything. This was an incident that occurred that is horrible, but there's no context behind it. When people watch this video, there's no context. We have no idea why this happened. We have no idea who that gentleman is, what situation he's coming from. We just see it happen and that's it. There's no context behind it. And we don't learn anything from it. We're not inspired to do anything about it. We don't know what to do about it. And so, I think, until there's more context behind it, until we understand the situation better and know that there's something we can do and take steps towards it, a video like this should not be posted. There's no benefit to it.

DS: Let me ask you this. I mean, for news organizations we make decisions and some of us chose, CBC chose not to broadcast this video. Others, Global News did publish the video, gave a warning, said that they felt it was in the public interest reflecting a horrible thing happening in the community. But in the social media space where it arrives in somebody's social media feed, I mean, how can we mitigate potential harm to children when it arrives in their inbox without any mediation?

DANIELLE LAW: Yeah, that's one of the hardest things that I'm actually trying to deal with now in my own research. My research is in cyber bullying and we're often dealing with situations like this where we see aggression and harm occurring in social media and people are seeing it and how can we mitigate that. And that's still a question that we're working on. A lot of it is being aware and we say that we need to do things to stop the perpetrator and talk to kids about responsible internet use. But ultimately it's extremely hard to control.

DS: Danielle Law, thank you for joining us this morning.

DANIELLE LAW: Thank you.

DS: That's Danielle Law, an Assistant Professor of Psychology and Youth and Children's Studies at Wilfrid Laurier University. She was in Brantford, Ontario. Of course, in a way it's not surprising that this ghastly video would show up online. But the fact that it has might give us pause to think about our relationship with social media and whether it can be improved. We have two guests standing by with their thoughts. Lisa Lynch is an Associate Professor of Journalism, Media and Communications at Drew University. She is in Califon, New Jersey. And Peter Chow-White is the Director of the School of Communication at Simon Fraser University. And we reached him in North York, Ontario. Hello to you both.

LISA LYNCH: Hello.

PETER CHOW-WHITE: Hi, good morning.

DS: Peter Chow-White, let's start with you. We've just heard from Danielle Law about the trauma that can happen from even, you know, occasional exposure to disturbing online content. What do we know about the long term impact of exposure to videos like this Abbotsford stabbing video?

PETER CHOW-WHITE: Yeah, I mean, first of all, I mean, I agree it's a horrible video and my heart goes out to those families and the community and what they're dealing with. You know, in long term media research, you know, the field of communication goes back, you know, 100 years. And over that time what we've found though is that, you know, short-term exposure does not necessarily create any sort of impact long-term in terms of behaviour, right? In order for people to be actually affected by the media in a certain way where it affects their behaviour, it has to be long-term exposure over time and repetition. So just seeing a video like this may create some short-term problems, especially for people who are further away from it. And of course, you've heard the young people in the video and what that's doing to them now. But with time and distance those types of feelings tend to go away.

DS: Lisa Lynch, what do you think the posting of this video on social media says about our relationship to social media?

LISA LYNCH: Well, I mean, I think that it's important to understand that we're, you know, we have a whole national or international conversation emerging about citizen witnessing, posting things that are indicative of some kind of social or political violence. And I think it's important to see that that people are getting used to seeing videos of violent acts on social media. On Twitter, on Facebook, social media, YouTube, often in the context of these conversations about police violence or other kinds of abuse. So all that is to say that the act of recording the video, I think you can kind of see that that might be some of the context, we're getting used to. When we see something violent going on we pick up our cameras--

DS: [interposing] We are as adults, but young children and the friends of this 13-year-old victim, are they getting used to it?

LISA LYNCH: Yeah, no, I think that that's all part of, I think that that's all part of the culture. But I think that the issue is that this is something that's emerging and it's still very very much in its infancy. That is, people are beginning to document things but the conversation about how to handle that material once you've documented it, that's a conversation that's incredibly recent. You know, for example there is an organization called Witness, which is an international organization just dedicated to trying to frame the conversation around citizen witnessing of violence. And they have, you know, very stringent recent guidelines that they've issued that focus on, you know, the difference between documenting something like this and circulating it. And they have a series of questions that they want people to ask themselves before they circulate things. You know, which is what is, you know, weighing the public interest versus weighing the individual risk, the rights of the accused and the individual, you know, dignity of the accused. So the guidelines are emerging, but for most of us I think the impetus is to document and because the guidelines are newer than the impetus to document, I think people often just share without thinking about it.

DS: Peter Chow, what do you think about the controversy that's been sparked by this video?

PETER CHOW-WHITE: Well, I mean, it's an interesting one. Videos like this, you know, start challenging our notions, you know, as Lisa’s been pointing out there. But, you know, it's the culture of what people do. And I wouldn't, you know, some generation seem to be doing it more easily and growing into that than others. But I wouldn't say it's just young people that do it. Adults did it too that work for news organizations, they circulated it on their news channels. But there's this moralizing that goes on in blaming of young people for doing these sorts of things, but they're documenting everything. And on top of that, this technology that they have and the ability to have to do it, the older generations made it and gave it to them and now they're starting to blame them for the ways that they use it. So there’s some inconsistencies there.

DS: Point, shoot and post, right?

PETER CHOW-WHITE: Well, it’s not even, it’s almost unthinking. It's just, it's culture, it's just the way that things are done. Young generations, and not just younger generations, but everybody is just sharing, grabbing, documenting and just their daily lives. You know, so who knows how many other things that person posted during the week. And this just becomes one of them in that kind of context.

DS: So if we're concerned here about the potential trauma, especially to those closest to an event like this, what are what are we to do? How do we generate a greater sort of media literacy for all of us. Not just not those of us who, you know, who study it or deal with media every day?

PETER CHOW-WHITE: You go.

LISA LYNCH: Well, I think media literacy as you say is a big part of it. I think that the emerging guidelines about the difference between documenting things and, you know, curating them and how you might post or circulate things responsibly. That is something that is not really a part of a media literacy curriculum, which traditionally focuses on understanding media messages. I think that's an important part of the story. Also being aware of the different platforms, there are different standards and, you know, the problems with those. I mean, if we're just starting to have this conversation now, those platforms are just really starting to grapple with, you know, this proliferation of circulation in a meaningful way. I think, you know, all the things that have happened with Facebook Live over the past few months have been a really graphic example of, you know, these platforms kind of put the, you know, just as people unthinkingly share platforms kind of unthinkingly create the ability to do this kind of circulation and are often caught, you know, unaware when things come up, you know, across the platforms that they're not really prepared to handle--

DS: Well, Lisa--

LISA LYNCH: So I think part of it's media literacy, I think part of it is there's just going to have to be an evolution of the way that platforms handle this kind of thing.

DS: Well, we're now seeing warnings that are accompanying the stabbing video, but the content hasn't necessarily been removed. On that Lisa Lynch, I mean, what responsibility do you think these platforms, be it Facebook or Twitter or YouTube have for policing content like this?

LISA LYNCH: Well, it's very tricky right? Because all of them, if you go into their community guidelines, you know, all of them say that they will, you know, flag or modify or remove things that have gratuitous violence or violence that is for the sake of itself, because they don't want to be accused of political censorship. So in a case like this, it's often, you know, the call of, you know, someone who's working in an office to kind of take a look at this quickly and make the, you know, make the judgment call about it. And again, that's a very difficult position that these platforms are in. They don't want to be in that position but they are going to increasingly be in this position. And I think that the standards and the guidelines and the vigilance will evolve over time.

DS: So far how would you rate the success or failure of these social media platforms in monitoring this kind of content?

LISA LYNCH: Well, I would give them a D in the sense that they, you know, refused for a long time to acknowledge that it was even an issue. And, you know, I would give them a B minus for noticing it recently and trying to have some more, you know, more serious conversations about it.

DS: Peter Chow, what issues does this raise for you when people start talking about censoring content or platforms, you know, restricting access to social media content that people are posting?

PETER CHOW-WHITE: Yeah, I mean, that becomes the national conversation in some ways because, you know, what freedom of speech means in different countries. It varies. You know, we start talking about restraining content then, you know, we start getting into restriction of freedom of speech and democratic communication and that's, you know, that that's a problem in many people's eyes. Now there are limits to this of course, hate speech and things like that, where there's laws but, you know, once this type of technology, you know, unlocks this type of creative and innovative potential in everyday people, it's really hard to put the genie back in the bottle. It's probably not going to happen.

DS: Do you think this video should have been posted, Peter?

PETER CHOW-WHITE: Well, I think what this video is getting us to do and it's the important part of it is, is that it creates a conversation. We need to have a conversation about, you know, at a larger level, a social level of what we find acceptable. You know, because what some people find acceptable others don't. It becomes a question of taste not law. But also, you know, for those families and stuff and all of us that have teenagers that are coming up in the world and, you know, their resumes are being created as they posting things online, these things can affect them later on in life. This is a time to have that conversation with your kids, with your teenagers, with your spouse, with people around you.

DS: Lisa Lynch, last word to you. I mean, are you optimistic that we're having this kind of conversation? That we're going to get to a better degree of self-control of posting and consuming online controversial and troubling images?

LISA LYNCH: I say that we're going to have a greater social understanding of what's involved. I think the jury's still out on what's going to happen with the platforms and also with the platforms and their relationship to media outlets. In terms of media outlets feeling compelled — as some outlets in Canada have felt — to post something largely because it's already out there on social media. For me that's a huge, you know, stumbling block that we have to overcome.

DS: Alright. We're going to have to leave it there. Lisa Lynch, Peter Chow-White, thank you for joining us.

PETER CHOW-WHITE: Thank you for having me.

LISA LYNCH: Thank you.

DS: That’s Lisa Lynch, Associate Professor of Journalism, Media and Communications at Drew University. She was in Califon, New Jersey. Peter Chow-White is the Director of the School of Communication at Simon Fraser University. He was in North York, Ontario. I'm Dave Seglins, you're listening to The Current on CBC Radio One. Coming up in the next half hour, gifted children and whether they should be part of the regular classroom.

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Are gifted classes necessary?

Guests: Julian Janes, Damian Janes, Gordon Porter, Hal Curties

DAVE SEGLINS: Hello, I'm Dave Seglins and you're listening to the Friday edition of The Current.

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DS: Still to come, a story of forgiveness so remarkable it would be hard to believe if it weren't true. Rais Bhuiyan was shot point blank while working at a gas station. It was a hate crime and the days soon after 9/11. But he survived and he went on to spend years trying to get his attacker off of death row. We'll have his story in half an hour. But first, wrapping up the gifted program.

SOUNDCLIP

CHILD 1: I knew I was inquisitive. It's like, and I didn't seem so much inclined to go out and play as in stay in and read a book.

CHILD 2: I've always been good at numbers since I was like one. I really just feels like, familiar. I like to learn about things, but I like to learn my way.

DS: Well, you can call them wiz kids, prodigies or use the term that many of our school boards do and call them gifted. They generally test in the top two per cent on IQ tests. But these days of having their own specialized classes, well those days may be over. The Ottawa Carleton board is rethinking gifted classes after a report raised some troubling points. Boys are overrepresented in the classes, as were kids whose parents could afford private psychological testing. And the report suggests that gifted kids can do just as well in regular classes. There's been a national trend toward ending some of these programs and getting everyone together in the same room, but the parents of gifted kids aren't necessarily in favour. Julian Janes is the father of a gifted student whose program could be cut. He's in Ottawa with his son Damian, who is eight-years-old and in grade three. Hello.

JULIAN JANES: Hello.

DAMIAN JANES: Hello.

DS: Julian, let's start with you. When did you suspect that Damian was gifted?

JULIAN JANES: As early as maybe 12-months-old, about a year old, a little bit the vocabulary that he developed very very early on. It was very obvious that he was developmentally in a different place than many of the other children. And so we kept an eye on it and we had to advocate for ourselves to make sure that his needs were met.

DS: So tell me a bit about that. What was the process for getting him tested?

JULIAN JANES: Well, at first it seemed pretty straightforward. So we went to the school board and we asked them just to have him tested through the public board. And the tests that they gave actually didn't show, it was a test that was a standardized test that was not intended to be an intelligence test, and it showed him to be not quite at the level to enter the program. And when that happens then you have the option of paying for your own private test assessment--

DS: [interposing] And did you do that?

JULIAN JANES: Yeah, and so we did that and it costed about 500 dollars. And there was a [unintelligible] a proper child psychologist and did the whole testing there and then he ended up qualifying for the for the congregated program that we have here in Ottawa.

DS: Well, why did you want him in this gifted program?

JULIAN JANES: Well, just it's all about having him in an environment, a learning environment where his social and his emotional needs are met, not just the academic ones. That's a concern to an extent, but really all kids, it doesn't matter what end of the spectrum you're on, it doesn't make any difference. It's about being able to be in a place that's well-suited to my son's strengths, to his interests, to his stage of readiness. So somewhere where he belongs and where he can have that.

DS: Damian, tell me a little bit about your program. What is the gifted program?

DAMIAN JANES: Well, I believe that it's supposed to be a little bit harder. Like, I know my brother in Grade one has a bunch of, well, I see his math work and then I remember the math work I had in grade one and I could I could see a big difference.

DS: Is there anything different other than the schoolwork that you think you notice?

DAMIAN JANES: Well, there are lots of people I could actually relate with in my class.

DS: Julian, from your vantage point is as dad, what has this program done for Damian?

JULIAN JANES: He doesn't see it as, it's not a special program at all. For him it's normal, for him it's, this is just a standard class where he feels like he belongs, where he's doing the work that is at his level that, you know, challenges him and where he meets kids who have similar interests.

DS: So what do you like about the program Damian?

DAMIAN JANES: Well, it's not too easy or too hard. And there are lots of nice teachers that clearly understand us and I need this program. It'll help me learn better, like, if I go to a normal class, I think what they're planning to do is have like separate people other than the normal teacher teaching the normally gifted kids.

DS: And what would the problem be with that?

DAMIAN JANES: Well, one, I think would be a lot more uncomfortable for the kids in the normal class.

DS: How come?

DAMIAN JANES: Because you have a bunch of kids that, like, have this special program. They might feel jealous and things like that.

DS: Julian, one of the criticisms that's leveled at gifted programs is that they can be elitist and they offer a level of enrichment instruction that's not available to other children. How do you respond to that?

JULIAN JANES: Yeah, that's a common misconception. I mean, this is not about our kids at all being better or worthy of more. Not at all. This is about all kids having a right to reach their own potential. Every child has untapped potential and every child has a right to be in a classroom where their social and emotional needs are met and where they can work towards what's called the zone of proximal development, a place where the work is challenging but doable, essentially. And that's all we want is equal access to an environment where they can thrive just like every other child.

DS: I guess when it comes to dollars and cents and setting priorities, why do you think it is? I’m hearing what you're saying prioritizing for each student's needs, to challenge each of them. But why do you think when we get into a situation where we're prioritizing special ed, the greater priority is given to those with learning disabilities as opposed to those who are considered gifted?

JULIAN JANES: Well, you know, it's a natural tendency and it doesn't bother us at all. I mean, let me just explain this, like, if there's a teacher in a classroom, if Damian's in a classroom with kids who are struggling to read, for example, I don't want that teacher to have to spend time answering all of Damian's questions and worrying about enriching him and giving him everything he needs. Those kids who are struggling, everybody wants them to get that help, to get the resources, to be the focus of the attention. Nobody's trying to take that away. And teachers try so hard and there's so much that they're expected to do. And for that reason, kids such as Damian, they need to be somewhere else where they're not going to be a burden on the teachers and they’re not going to be a burden on those kids that need to that attention.

DS: You yourself had to pay privately to get the testing done, to get Damian admitted to the school and that's been a criticism, that that's a barrier for many who might otherwise want to be in a gifted program. Do you see that as problematic?

JULIAN JANES: Absolutely. The whole gifted community is very much on board with the problem of equity of access to the program. We've always wanted there to be a universal screener, early intervention strategies to identify children because gifted children are not just rich kids, anybody from any socioeconomic background can be identified.

DS: Damian, what are your friends at school saying about maybe having to leave their class to go to a different school?

DAMIAN JANES: I've heard a couple of them say that they wouldn't be too happy about going to a different school. All I know is I was really really sad when my dad told me they might have to shut down the gifted program.

DS: Well, we'll watch this with interest. I just want to say thank you for joining us this morning and nice to meet you on the radio.

JULIAN JANES: Thank you.

DAMIAN JANES: Thank you.

DS: Damian Janes is a gifted student and Julian Janes is his father. And they were in Ottawa. We asked the Ottawa Carleton school board for comment and it sent us a statement which reads in part, quote, “the current delivery model for the specialized program class has been in place for over 20 years and although it meets the needs of many students, it does not support the needs of all gifted learners. The research supports gifted learners having opportunities to learn together but opportunities can also be created by allowing clusters of gifted students to learn together for part of the day, week or school year,” end quote. Well, gifted programs fall under the umbrella of special needs in most school boards and advocates of inclusive learning say all kids, those with special needs — including the gifted — benefit from being together in a regular classroom. Gordon Porter is the Director of Inclusive Education Canada. We reached him in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates, where he is advising the authorities there on how to make their education system more inclusive. Hello.

GORDON PORTER: Hello there, how are you?

DS: Fine, thank you. What's your response to what our first two guests from Ottawa had to say?

GORDON PORTER: Well first of all, I think they're very well spoken about the needs for Damian to have a challenging and interesting school program. The thing that I would say is that my expectation is that a regular class teacher with support, with coaching from somebody who knows more about meeting the needs of a child who can be described as gifted or needing enrichment, is something that we can expect from a regular class teacher. That in fact Damian could be challenged within the regular classroom, with the right kinds of support to his teacher could be provided.

DS: We heard Julian say that yes a regular class teacher could do it, but that they like it better to have a specialized program to do work and focus on his unique emotional and social and academic needs.

GORDON PORTER: Well, I think all of us would like that for our children, as much individualization as possible. And the fact is that funding special education, whether it's for the gifted or for the learning disabled or children with intellectual disabilities, that’s not gone very well. There's never enough money, there are always children who fall through the gaps who aren't being served. And the money that goes to support all these regular programs actually takes capacity out of making the regular system an effective system. Every time a child leaves a regular class with hopefully a very high skilled well-trained teacher and goes to something specific that's different, a standalone program, it takes money out of the mainstream and it weakens the capacity of the mainstream to serve the broad number of kids that are still there.

DS: OK, but beyond funding, from an education academic standpoint what are the benefits of an inclusive classroom if you've got gifted children as sort of as they describe it, outliers?

GORDON PORTER: I don't think looking to serve children who are labeled as gifted in the regular classroom is just about funding. It's about seeing the role of the regular classroom and serving all children, diverse groups of children. And I think there are a lot of models of education that have emerged in the last 20 to 25 years that support that. They include the idea of enrichment instead of gifted education. They include the idea that children have multiple intelligences, some children are very high in logical, mathematical or in verbal linguistic skills, and those are the ones that tend to get captured by traditional intelligence tests and that place them traditionally in gifted programs. But there are children who are high achievers in musical intelligence and interpersonal intelligence and spatial and athletic intelligence, all kinds of other areas. And I think schools have to be challenged to meet all of these areas, not just the traditional that go towards academic accomplishment by itself.

DS: And you think that that kind of expectation, teaching the wide breadth of students be it, you know, people with disabilities or needing enriched or gifted whichever term, that can be done by a regular class teacher?

GORDON PORTER: I do. And I think that in many places where it's not being done effectively, the problem is that the resources that could be used to support teachers to do these things are going to standalone special education programs. Every time you take a child out — and of course it's not usually just one child, it’s a number of children — you weaken the resources available to strengthen the core of our public education system. It's a systemic challenge and it also has been clearly shown that it doesn't increase the achievement of those children who leave. And I think that the research is pretty clear that children who are bright and talented achieve just as high results in inclusive classrooms as they do in standalone classrooms.

DS: But we're hearing from parents like Julian and other advocates of these specialized gifted programs, they say look, you need the specialized program for their kids to reach their full potential.

GORDON PORTER: Well, we could say that about any, I mean, any program that has small numbers of students and has creative and capable, talented, innovative teachers is going to feel good to the participants that take part in it. The whole kind of experience that children get in gifted programs needs to be brought to the regular class. The innovative approaches, the project learning, the focus on identifying questions and solving problems.

DS: Do you see a distinction to be made between gifted children and those with learning disabilities, in terms of who gets a priority in the regular classroom?

GORDON PORTER: No, I think, not in a pure sense no. I think every child has the right to be supported to meet their learning capacity within the school system. You have to prioritize according to the needs of the child to some extent. But in a philosophical basis and in a practical basis no. I think every family that sends their child to a public education system has the right and should have the expectation that the school can design a program that can meet that child's needs, that can be challenging and rewarding for that child, whatever their ability or disability. And in many cases the people who say that regular classes won't work and won't do the job effectively, you can interpret that that maybe they're giving up on the capacity of regular education. And let's remember that 90 per cent of children receive their education there. So if we don't have standards for quality there, what do we say to all the rest of the vast majority of children who spend their five or six hours every day in the regular mainstream education system?

DS: Do you think there should be gifted testing to identify gifted kids at all?

GORDON PORTER: No and I don't think there should be testing at the other end of the spectrum either. I think children should go to school. We should do functional assessments of what they can do and what they can’t do, what their talents are in order to inform teachers about how to challenge them and how to capture their imaginations and get them motivated for learning. But on a pure identification and label basis there's very little productive work that comes from saying that you give a label, like a child is gifted, I mean, what does that mean? Gifted in what? Gifted in verbal linguistic skills? That's usually what it means, because we use IQ tests to do that. Well, there's a whole range of human behaviour and child behaviour that has nothing to do with those tasks that were developed a 100 years ago.

DS: Lots to think about. Mr. Porter, thanks for joining us this morning.

GORDON PORTER: Thank you for having me.

DS: Gordon Porter is the Director of Inclusive Education Canada. We reached him in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Well of course, being gifted isn't always a blessing. Educators of gifted children say that these kids learn differently and often struggle to fit in socially. Hal Curties has taught gifted children for years. He's now the Principal of the elementary campus of the Westmount Charter School. It's a school for the gifted in Calgary. And charter schools in Alberta are publicly funded and they don't charge tuition. Hal Curties joins us from Calgary. Hello.

HAL CURTIES: Good morning, how are you?

DS: Fine, thank you. What are your thoughts on what you've heard so far?

HAL CURTIES: Well, I think the thing that kind of gets overlooked in this conversation is giftedness falls under the special education category. And I think our job as special educators is to understand what the barriers are to full participation in a child's education. And if we don't understand gifted then we won't understand the needs and if we don't understand that needs we're not going to be able to meet them. So for me what was being missed in the last conversation was a really good understanding of what gifted kids’ needs are. And for many gifted kids the need is to be with other gifted kids.

DS: Why is that?

HAL CURTIES: Because gifted kids experience life in a different way. And I want to say right up front, not in a better way. It's not a quality thing. It's a different experience of life. And they need to be with people who are cognitively in the same area that they are and who have the same kind of social emotional experiences as you heard Damian and his dad talk about. They need to see themselves and the people around them. And often times in an inclusive setting, with all the best intentions, these kids do not have peers in their classroom. And so, just by virtue of the group they are kind of on the outside.

DS: But what about them as individuals, beyond the group? What's the difference between the way gifted kids and regular kids, in terms of how they learn?

HAL CURTIES: Well, gifted kids tend to learn more quickly. They have incredible memories often and highly developed abstract reasoning capabilities. And so their experience of learning needs to be a little bit different than a typical child.

DS: Why can't that be accomplished with gifted curriculum in a regular classroom?

HAL CURTIES: Well, I think theoretically it might be accomplished in a regular classroom. And for many gifted kids their regular classroom experience is phenomenal. But there are many many gifted kids who really need to be with other gifted kids in order for that classroom experience to be optimal.

DS: What are the pitfalls of being gifted?

HAL CURTIES: One of the pitfalls of being gifted is that you have a heightened awareness of the world. So you have a greater awareness of what's going on in the world and you tend to think about things that are different than your age peers. And so the kinds of things you're thinking about, the kinds of things that you would like to do tend to be different than kids your own age and so that can be quite isolating.

DS: What about the argument though that by working in a regular classroom they're being socialized in a way that's going to help them outside of school to operate in the larger society?

HAL CURTIES: I think that what you're talking about in a typical experience and many of the gifted kids that I've known is that their experience of socializing in a regular school is that they are socially isolated. And so, I don't think that putting some gifted kids in a place where their experience is to be socially isolated prepares them well for anything in the adult world.

DS: Well, another of the criticisms that we've touched on is the issue of testing and that parents of children have to go through private psychological testing, they have to pay for it, in order to be screened to then qualify. What do you make of that?

HAL CURTIES: Well, I think that what testing does for us is it gives us the best information about the child. And in order to program to meet their needs, we have to have the best understanding of what's going on for them. And Mr. Porter seemed to not be supportive of the idea of testing in any of the areas that we were talking about. And I think that in order to properly program for any group of kids, we need to really understand what their needs are and testing is the best way to understand what those needs are.

DS: I think he said there should be functional tests but maybe not relying on traditional IQ testing.

HAL CURTIES: But intelligence tests for gifted kids give us a lot of information about their ability to reason abstractly and their verbal abilities and so on. And we need to have that information. A functional test isn't going to give us the kind of information we need.

DS: What's at stake here for the child themselves? What happens if a gifted child doesn't get the appropriate education?

HAL CURTIES: Well I think a couple of things happen. First of all, what happens to a gifted child who needs to be in a congregated setting and isn't has a lonely experience. So, you know, that can be one of things that doesn't happen. Another thing is that we heard Damian's father talk about the zone of proximal development or something that we like to call developmental stretch. A lot of kids can go through, gifted kids, can go through a regular program and be successful without ever really achieving that developmental stretch. So their developmental potential is never really reached because the work that they're being given is something that they can easily master.

DS: How well do you think these children are served by our education system across the country?

HAL CURTIES: Well, across the country a lot of our gifted kids are not served particularly well, primarily because they're misunderstood. And the myth that they'll be fine if we leave them alone is really the number one myth about gifted kids. They will look like they're fine if we leave them alone but they're not really fine. They're not working to their potential, they are not having their creativity challenged and their needs are really not being met.

DS: Mr. Curties, thank you very much for joining us this morning.

HAL CURTIES: My pleasure.

DS: Hal Curties is the Principal of the elementary campus of the Westmount Charter School, a school for the gifted. He was in Calgary. Well now let us know what you think, especially if you have experience with gifted programs. Are they worth keeping or are all children better off learning together? You can tweet us @TheCurrentCBC, you can also find us on Facebook or send us an email. You can just go to our website cbc.ca/thecurrent, just click on the contact link. Well, coming up in our next half hour, saving your would-be executioner from execution. We'll hear the remarkable journey of Rais Bhuiyan. I'm Dave Seglins, and you're listening to the Friday edition of The Current.

[Music: Extro]

DAVE SEGLINS: Hello, I'm Dave Seglins and this is the Friday edition of The Current. We'll take a moment to tell you about something coming up on Monday's show. It's a firsthand account of what it's like to be the captain of a sinking ship. The Fairy Queen of the North hit an island off the coast of British Columbia more than 10 years ago and sank. Well, Colin Henthorne was the Captain of that ship. He was asleep in his cabin when the vessel ran aground. He awoke to frantic pounding on his door followed by the unmistakable sound of the ferry hitting rock.

SOUNDCLIP

COLIN HENTHORNE: I guess the first thing I did when I got there is I picked up the microphone for the public address system and called all passengers and crew to get up to the embarkation deck where the lifeboats and life rafts are would be boarded from. As I was doing that, I switched on every exterior deck light and I looked, I was looking down and I could see my chest actually moving in and out with every beat of my heart, which was just pounding like crazy. I thought my ribs were going to break from the force of that.

DS: Monday on The Current Anna-Maria Tremonti speaks with Colin Henthorne about what happened the night that the Queen of the North went down and how the sinking changed his life. You are listening to the Friday edition of The Current on CBC Radio One, I'm Dave Seglins. Coming up next, words of repentance from death row.

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Shooting victim recounts fight to save his would-be killer from death penalty

Guests: Rais Bhuiyan

SOUNDCLIP

[Music: somber guitar plucking]

Even though I lay on this gurney seconds away from my death, I am at total peace. May the Lord Jesus Christ be with me. Hate is going on in this world and it has to stop. Hate causes a lifetime of pain. I'm still a proud American, Texas loud, Texas proud. God bless America. God bless everyone. Let's do this damn thing. I feel I am going to sleep now.

DAVE SEGLINS: Those were the last words of Mark Stroman as he scribbled them down on death row. Mark Stroman was executed in Texas, in 2011, a decade after his murderous shooting spree targeting Muslims inspired by the 9/11 attacks. Well that fateful day he killed two people. The third person he shot, though, survived and in a way that no one could ever have predicted that shooting victim became an unlikely campaigner to save Mark Stroman’s life. Rais Bhuiyan, a former Air Force pilot from Bangladesh was working at a Dallas gas station that day when Mark Stroman burst in and shot him twice in the face. It was a hate crime and a near-death experience, but it was also the start of a remarkable journey of hope and forgiveness that's told in a new documentary film called An Eye For An Eye. Rais Bhuiyan is with me from a studio in Hartford, Connecticut. Hello.

RAIS BHUIYAN: Good morning.

DS: We just heard Mark Stroman’s last words. What are you thinking when you hear those words?

RAIS BHUIYAN: It is very very painful. I feel pain in my heart that we lost a human life without dealing with the root cause, hate and ignorance and violence that is spreading like a cancer all over the world. But at the same time I feel there is a hope the way he talked about the last words. How he inspired everyone to be more peaceful, merciful. So it is a very mixed feelings, one way I feel very sad, on the other end I feel there is inspiration, there is a hope there.

DS: I want to get to your journey of hope in a moment. But take us back to the very first time you ever heard Mark Stroman’s voice. That day in September 21st, 2001. What happened?

RAIS BHUIYAN: September 21st, 2001, around 12:30pm, it was Friday. It was raining since morning, cats and dogs. Business was pretty slow. Suddenly a customer burst in the store wearing bandanas, sunglasses, baseball cap and holding a double barrel shotgun pointing at my face directly. And I was robbed in the same gas station before, so I thought that would be a robbery. So I was ready with all the cash putting on the counter. And as soon as he walked in I said sir here is all the money, take it but please do not shoot me. And he was not looking at the money though. He was looking at me directly. I felt a cold air flow through my spine, that why he's not looking at the money. If he's here for robbing me he should be taking the money and leave as soon as possible. But then he mumbled a question. Where are you from? And before I could say more than excuse me, he pulled the trigger from four to five feet away.

DS: He pulled the trigger. What do you remember?

RAIS BHUIYAN: I remember seeing him standing very close to me and then when he asked me that question, that time I realized that he was not there for money, he was there for me.

DS: He pulled the trigger. Tell us about your injuries.

RAIS BHUIYAN: Well as a result of this shooting I received more than 38 pellets on my face, on the right side of my head, right side of my face and I lost vision in one eye. I lost a tooth which was thankfully replaced. I lost my job. I lost a home, my medical bills went up. It kept piling, it went up more than $60,000 6-0. The hospital I was taken into was private and expensive they discharged me the next day morning and told me to arrange follow up medical treatment. I had a fiancé back home, she also moved on and it’s just one after another one. My bank account got closed. The credit card I had also got canceled since I couldn't pay the minimum monthly payment. So except my life, I think I lost almost everything.

DS: Mark Stroman. What did you know about him when he burst through your door that day?

RAIS BHUIYAN: I had no knowledge about Mark Stroman. I came to know about him after he was arrested on 5th October, after he shot and killed Mr. Patel. He was on a journey to kill as many Muslims as possible as a retaliation of 9/11 terrorist attack. And if he was not arrested, he would have killed more people. That was the first thing I came to know about him.

DS: And he was described in the media in those early days as a white supremacist. Was that a fair assessment do you think?

RAIS BHUIYAN: That's what he said. He voluntarily gave interview with the local news media where he said that what he did, most Americans wanted to do but didn't have the guts. He claimed he’s a true American, he's a patriot and he should be given a medal for his action.

DS: As you were putting your life back together, what did you think of him and what he did to you?

RAIS BHUIYAN: After this incident happened, I went through a healing process where I was able to rebuild my life and at the same time I had a chance to get to learn about him a little bit. And what I came to know that that he's another human being like me who went through a lot of challenges in his own life since he was a kid. He was damaged inside. I saw him also as a victim--

DS: [interposing] But he granted interviews where he was an unrepentant racist, justifying his actions of killing people attempting to shoot and kill you, blaming it all on 9/11.

RAIS BHUIYAN: Well that was a part of ignorance. He never knew anyone who was Muslim. He never traveled out of Dallas. He had no knowledge about the rest of the world about, you know, people who are different from him. His heart was filled with ignorance and hate. I mean, he was hunting for Arabs but not one of his three victims was from Middle East. He didn't know, he couldn't differentiate from right and wrong. If he was able to do that, I'm sure he would not end up shooting and killing people and end his life in, you know, in death row.

DS: Now, the film An Eye For An Eye, directed by the Israeli filmmaker llan Ziv, is very much about the journey that Mark Stroman takes from his initial crimes to his awareness. Ziv, in the film starts to see glimpses of humanity in this white supremacist. And the film captures Stroman starting to express some remorse. Were you aware of those changes at the time?

RAIS BHUIYAN: I was able to read some of his blogs and at the beginning those blogs were still viewing his negative views against Muslims and what he did he was trying to justify. But in course of time, looks like he went through a transformation. And when I started my campaign in 2011 after coming from pilgrimage from Mecca, when he came to know that one of his victims started a campaign to save his life from death row, he was reduced to tears. It striked him powerfully. And he talked about mercy, he talked about justice, world peace, he thanked the entire Muslim community.

DS: Well tell me about your campaign. Where did it come from and why did this become your number one priority?

RAIS BHUIYAN: Well, that's a very good question. After this shooting incident happened to me, I went through a healing process where I grew mentally, psychologically, spiritually. And I was able to rebuild my life and I was able to get a good job in IT in 2006. And I was able to go for a Muslim religious pilgrimage to Mecca and I took my mother with me, stayed there for a month and I asked God why did you save my life? You took two others, you could have taken mine. Why did you give me a chance to live? What am I supposed to do with this life? Help me, guide me to understand. And I also thought about Mark Stroman, the shooting incident, and I realized that he's another human being sitting on death row waiting to be executed. And I asked myself what can I do for him? Because I had a promise on my death bed. I asked God if he'd give me a chance to live, I promise I would do good things with my life. And I asked myself what had I done so far? Yes, I had done well but who was benefited? Only me. And I felt that it was not enough that I forgave Mark Stroman before but I didn't feel that it was enough. And in the Quran, there is a verse, chapter five verses 32, it says very clearly that saving a life is like saving the entire mankind and taking a human life is like taking the entire mankind. I was extremely inspired after coming back from pilgrimage from Mecca. And I thought that if he was given a second chance he might become a better person, he can contribute to society in a positive way.

DS: Do you believe that Mark Stroman’s transformation, his repentance was genuine? Do you worry at all that maybe he was doing that as a bit of an act because he knew he was on death row?

RAIS BHUIYAN: Well, to be honest with you, I believe he was transformed. I believe he went through a healing process as well like me. He wrote a letter from death row a month before he was executed, this long letter to me. In one paragraph he said that my stepfather embedded some lessons I should have never learned. It has taken me far too long to unlearn some of them and I'm still working on some of them. I don't know who your parents were but it is obvious they are wonderful people to lead you to act this way to someone you have every right to hate. And he ended the letter with these couple of lines. That my whole life I had believed hope was like a hand full of rain, but over the last few weeks you have given me more hope than I have possessed in all my years of life.

DS: You accept that. You've forgiven him. Are the other victims and the family members who lost loved ones to Stroman’s crimes, do they share your view? What do they think?

RAIS BHUIYAN: Well, it was not easy because in their case they lost a loved one, they lost their father, they lost their husbands. And before I went in public, start of the campaign, I wanted to talk with them as well and make sure that all the victims are on the same page. So I called them because I kept a good relation with the other victims after this incident happened in 2001. And I explained that the reason why I was trying to run a campaign to save his life and it was very sensitive conversation with them. They were crying on the phone. I talked to the widows and also visited one in person. They took that took little time. Finally they came back and they said yes, we also forgive Mark Stroman. And one of the families they even joined my campaign and joined all the press conferences, all the media interviews and also the last three days when I was going from one court to the other to stop the execution, also came and stayed with me in the hotel and they were present in the court as well.

DS: Now, would you fought a strongly against his death sentence if he had remained unrepentant, you know, as a white supremacist?

RAIS BHUIYAN: Well, what I did was based on my promise to God, based on compassion. This is what I wanted to do to save the life. He never came to me, ask for forgiveness or mercy. So even if he was not changed still I would do what I did, because I did it, I wanted to set a new narrative in this world so that people can work for the world based on mutual respect, dignity and understanding. That beyond hate there is a life. Beyond hate, you know, still there's a possibility of reconciliation.

DS: You worked tirelessly to try to save his life but you didn't actually speak to him directly until the very day of his execution. There's a phone call that the film captured, let's have a listen to that right now.

SOUNDCLIP

MARK STROMAN: Rais, how are you doing Rais? [unintelligible] Man, thank you for everything you’re trying to do for me man. You are inspiring. Thank you from my heart dude.

RAIS BHUIYAN: Mark, I forgive you and I don’t hate you. I never hated you.

MARK STROMAN: Thank for being such an awesome person. I mean that.

RAIS BHUIYAN: You’ll be always there.

MARK STROMAN: Thank you. Hey, you touched my heart, like, I would never have expected.

DS: Rais Bhuiyan, what was that conversation like for you?

RAIS BHUIYAN: It was very touchy. I mean, I was crying after that conversation because I couldn't take the load. Me and my legal team, two lawyers and several supporters and paralegals, we were getting ready to go to the court to give a last fight, and a human being sitting next to the execution chamber waiting to die. And I felt extremely pressure because if I win this fight, he lives. And if I fail then he dies. It was too much pressure on me and I couldn't bear the load. And when I talked to him, when he said that I love you bro. I still, you know, I remember that there were teardrops falling on the floor. He saw me as his brother the day he is going to be executed. If he could see the same way ten years back, we don’t have the conversation. It was very emotional. I was crying. And I was getting ready to go to the court to save his life. So the person who made me cry ten years back, he made me cry again the day he's going to be executed. The first day I cried for my own life and that day I was crying for him.

DS: The state of Texas ultimately killed Mark Stroman. He left behind three children. Are you in touch with any of his family?

RAIS BHUIYAN: Yes. Before he was executed I was in touch with his sister who lived in Dallas. And after his execution I met his daughter, I met his son, Amber and Robert. Robert was in prison when Mark was executed. After Robert came out in 2013, stayed for a year or so then he went back again to prison for another 14 years. I was able to meet him in a hospital and I’m still in touch with Robert. He is getting eligible for parole beginning of next year. And I'm going to write a letter to the parole board. That was my promise to him before he took the plea. He asked me if I promise I would either write to his parole board or testify if it is needed, then he will take the plea. And I promised him that if I stay alive I will join your parole hearing if I can or I will write to them. So now it is my time to write. And I try to stay in touch with the daughters and I tried my best to help them. They know my phone number. They know my email address and they know that my door is open for them.

DS: What motivates you to stay in touch with them?

RAIS BHUIYAN: Well, first of all I see them as a human being as well and I see them how they're going to stuck with the same cycle. Lack of education, lack of guidance, lack of role model. Life is totally messed up with drugs, dysfunctional family. And I feel extremely for them that I could be them as well, but luckily I was born and raised in a very loving caring family and every children deserve that. And they're also part of our society and I feel that it's my responsibility as well to do something for them so that they can get out of this cycle. They can enjoy the life the way every human being should. And I challenge myself every day that I should not give up, I should do my best to help others before my time is up and I will never hate anyone. I will do my best to help others and they need help.

DS: You've started an advocacy group called World Without Hate. Tell us about the work you're doing.

RAIS BHUIYAN: Well, I founded this organization called World Without Hate in 2011. While I was running this campaign to save Mark Stroman’s life I received a tremendous amount of support from all over the world, starting from Norway to Australia to Brazil, even from some of the countries I never even heard of that. And after Mark Stroman was executed I channeled that energy, that support into a non-profit and wanted to keep working to make this world a better place for us and for the next generations. And we believe in the transformational power of mercy and forgiveness. And no matter who you are, where you come from, you are entitled with your basic human rights and dignity. And we try our best to educate people, to learn from one another, to treat everyone with respect and also to contribute so that we can live in a better world and we can leave a world for our next generations.

DS: You know, we're days away from the US presidential election. In an election that's been marred by a lack of respect and divisiveness. What are your thoughts on the campaign?

RAIS BHUIYAN: Well there is no doubt about that this is a historic election in the US. And it's pretty sad that what we faced after 9/11, a similar hateful rhetoric, speech, acts and deeds, we're seeing a similar behaviour again during these historical elections in 2016. It’s heartbreaking, it’s unacceptable and that shows that there are a lot of people out there angry, frustrated and instead of taking responsibility, they are being energized to point fingers to the other, to the minorities which should not be the case. At the end of the day, we all are Americans. I respect Mr. Trump for obtaining the GOP nomination for president. And as such a leader, I urge him to learn about and get to know the minorities and immigrants who call United States home. I urge him, instead of putting Americans against one another, lead everyone. And together we can overcome our problems, we can overcome all the issues, we can make powerful decisions, strong decisions to overcome all the problems. But by pointing fingers, by demonizing, discriminating, mocking it’s not going to solve any of the problems, it will further divide us. We are already divided and it is going to divide further.

DS: Rais, what do you think you learned during the decade that Mark Stroman was part of your life?

RAIS BHUIYAN: There were a lot of things how I went through. He was challenged in my dream country one after another one and financially, mentally, psychologically. But I never gave up. I was always hopeful that there's always something good in bad situation. But we have to find ways to see the positive things and what I learned in my childhood to forgive people not to hate. Never give up. These all these were theory to me. This incident gave me, unfortunately, gave me an opportunity to practice what actually my parents taught me, what my Islamic faith taught me, to forgive, to be merciful and not to give up, pursue the dream. Yes, it was a terrible incident happened to me, but I feel now that I'm a better human being, I am stronger than ever before and I am more merciful, more forgiving, I’m a peaceful person.

DS: It is a remarkable tale. It's a remarkable film. Rais Bhuiyan, thank you.

RAIS BHUIYAN: Thank you very much.

DS: Rais Bhuiyan is featured in the documentary An Eye For An Eye, which premieres in Toronto at the Hot Docs Film Festival November 11th. He's also founder of the organization World Without Hate and he's campaigned on behalf of Hillary Clinton in the US presidential election campaign. Rais Bhuiyan joined me from Hartford, Connecticut. Well, that is our program for today. Remember you can always take The Current with you on the go on the free CBC Radio app. It lets you browse through past episodes and you can start listening with just a few clicks. You can search for stories you've missed or things you might want to hear again or listen live to your local CBC station. It's right from your smartphone or tablet and it's free from the App Store or Google Play. Finally, we were speaking earlier about gifted students. Well, there are gifted children and then there are prodigies like Kevin Chen. The ten-year-old Calgary boy recently became the youngest student ever to graduate from the Royal Conservatory of Music’s grade nine exam. He has his teaching diploma, he can teach conservatory level piano. He's also a composer with more than 80 compositions including symphonies to his credit. We're going to leave you with a little bit of Kevin Chen on the piano, and yes I did say he is ten-years-old. I'm Dave Seglins, thanks for listening to the Friday edition of The Current.

[Music: Kevin Chen]

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November 4, 2016 full episode transcript

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