Miraca Una Murdoch Gross (1944-2022) was an

Australian Australian(s) may refer to: Australia * Australia, a country * Australians, citizens of the Commonwealth of Australia ** European Australians ** Anglo-Celtic Australians, Australians descended principally from British colonists ** Aboriginal A ...

author and scholar recognised as an authority on the academic, social and emotional needs of

gifted Intellectual giftedness is an intellectual ability significantly higher than average. It is a characteristic of children, variously defined, that motivates differences in school programming. It is thought to persist as a trait into adult life, wi ...

children.

Life

Born and trained in

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...

but spending a large part of her life in Australia, Gross was Professor of

Gifted Education Gifted education (also known as gifted and talented education (GATE), talented and gifted programs (TAG), or G/T education) is a broad group of special practices, procedures, and theories used in the education of children who have been identified a ...

at the

University of New South Wales The University of New South Wales (UNSW), also known as UNSW Sydney, is a public research university based in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. It is one of the founding members of Group of Eight, a coalition of Australian research-intensiv ...

School of Education and the director of Gifted Education, Research, Resource and Information Centre. She was a frequent speaker at international conferences and a columnist for the quarterly journal
Understanding Our Gifted.
Gross graduated from

Purdue University Purdue University is a public land-grant research university in West Lafayette, Indiana, and the flagship campus of the Purdue University system. The university was founded in 1869 after Lafayette businessman John Purdue donated land and mone ...

with her PhD thesis being titled "Children of exceptional intellectual potential: Their origin and development". Her 1993 book ''Exceptionally Gifted Children'' presents fifteen subjects selected from a longitudinal study of 40 Australian children with IQs in excess of 160, including Fields Medal recipient Terence Tao among others. The second edition was published in 2003. There were 60 highly gifted children in her ongoing study. Gross advocated radical

acceleration In mechanics, acceleration is the rate of change of the velocity of an object with respect to time. Accelerations are vector quantities (in that they have magnitude and direction). The orientation of an object's acceleration is given by t ...

for exceptionally and profoundly gifted children. Gross won five international research awards and held the position of President of the Gifted and Talented Children's Association of

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a state in the southern central part of Australia. It covers some of the most arid parts of the country. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories ...

for six years. From 1995 to 1999 she served on the seven-person Executive of the World Council for Gifted and Talented Children. Gross was inducted as a Member of the

Order of Australia The Order of Australia is an honour that recognises Australian citizens and other persons for outstanding achievement and service. It was established on 14 February 1975 by Elizabeth II, Queen of Australia, on the advice of the Australian Gov ...

in 2008.Member of the Order of Australia
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Selected books

* 1993 ''Exceptionally Gifted Children'' * 200
''Exceptionally Gifted Children''
2nd Edition * 2010 ''Miraca Gross, In Her Own Write: A Lifetime in Gifted Education''

Selected articles

Factors in the social adjustment and social acceptability of extremely gifted children

* ttp://www.hoagiesgifted.org/d_major_chord.htm From “the saddest sound” to the D Major chord: The gift of accelerated progression
Radical Acceleration in Australia: Terence Tao

Small Poppies: highly gifted children in the early years

Awards

* 1987 Intertel Foundation: Hollingworth Award for Excellence in Research in the Education and Psychology of the Gifted * 1988 and 1990 Mensa International Education and Research Foundation Award for Excellence * 1995 American

National Association for Gifted Children National may refer to: Common uses * Nation or country ** Nationality – a ''national'' is a person who is subject to a nation, regardless of whether the person has full rights as a citizen Places in the United States * National, Maryland, c ...

(NAGC): Early Scholar Award * 1995 UNSW: Vice-Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Teaching * 1997 Australian Government: Australian Award for University Teaching in Education * 2003

Australian College of Educators The Australian College of Educators (ACE) is an Australian national professional association for educators. Membership is open to all professional educators working in the early childhood, school, and tertiary education sectors, as well as to edu ...

: Sir Harold Wyndham Medal for outstanding services to Australian education * 2005 American National Association for Gifted Children: Distinguished Scholar Award

References

External links

* * * * * * Living people Members of the Order of Australia Australian women academics Purdue University alumni Academic staff of the University of New South Wales 1944 births {{australia-academic-bio-stub