[jakear]

Yes this. As someone who was “gifted” in school but with a father who teaches mild/moderate learning disabilities, the skill sets of the two ends of the spectrum of teachers are dramatically different. “Gifted” student teachers can take as a given that their students are there to learn and generally speaking want to be there. For my father getting students to begin to think that is a big part of the job. To replace him with a “gifted” student teacher who has no experience with that type of clientele would be absurd.