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Brazilian Gifted Students Put Their Questions to Dr. Joseph Renzulli in Folha de S.Paulo
On October 12, 2026, Folha de S.Paulo, one of Brazil's largest daily newspapers, turned its Monday interview over to three gifted young Brazilians. They wrote the questions, and Dr. Joseph Renzulli, 90, answered them. Their conversation ranged from friendship and invention to where giftedness comes from, and it arrived four months after Brazil enacted Lei 15.436/2026, its first national law for gifted students.
Folha de S.Paulo invited Sara, 10, Rafael, 12, and Alexandre, 19, to interview Dr. Renzulli, in a story whose headline called him the papa, or pope, of giftedness. They asked about curiosity, belonging, invention, and where talent comes from. Again and again, his answers came back to one idea: a child's interests are the engine of talent, and no single test score can capture them.
Three Students, Three Very Different Talents
Journalist Laura Mattos invited three gifted young Brazilians to write their own questions for Dr. Renzulli, Professor Emeritus at the University of Connecticut, who has studied giftedness for more than five decades. Officially retired but still writing and advising researchers, he answered them by video from his home.
Sara Manni Gomide
An artist and athlete who took up skating at three and now plays soccer and practices kung fu. Known for deep, philosophical questions, she loves animals.
Rafael Kessler
A math competition medalist who created his own formula, the Fórmula Kessler, from a public school math olympiad problem. He also builds technology and programming projects.
Alexandre Andrade de Almeida
A second-year medical student at the University of São Paulo who conducts Fapesp-funded undergraduate research at the São Paulo State Cancer Institute.
Belonging, and the Speed of Thought
Sara, 10Sara asked about something many gifted children feel but rarely say out loud: why is it so hard for her to sleep away from home, on school trips or at a friend's house? Dr. Renzulli pointed to the growing research on the social and emotional lives of gifted children. We all feel better, he said, among people who share our interests and respect that we won't always believe the same things. His advice was simple: don't stay with children who tease you; find the ones who like what you like.
Her second question gave the story its headline: why does she think so fast? Dr. Renzulli admitted there is no easy answer. The human brain is complex, he said; some people think quickly, some slowly, and some only about certain things. What matters is that adults encourage and reward children for their curiosity, their eagerness to study something new, and their wish to find others who share an interest.
Advice for a Young Inventor
Rafael, 12Rafael asked what Dr. Renzulli would tell a ten-year-old who had invented a mathematical formula, created a language, and come up with names for enormous numbers, and then revealed that the boy was himself. Dr. Renzulli's advice was to look beyond the regular classroom, where a teacher may not be able to offer such specialized support, to people at a nearby university, a government agency, or a company working in that field. Online connections can open doors too, he noted, imagining a child who loves poetry getting to talk with Brazil's best-known poet.
Rafael also asked how a child who loves inventing things that don't yet exist can turn curiosity into knowledge and, one day, contribute to science and society. Start locally, Dr. Renzulli said. Find other children with similar interests, even in other grades, and work on projects together, then reach out online to people doing serious work in that area.
Nature, Nurture, and Connection
Alexandre, 19Alexandre noted that giftedness was long thought to be mostly genetic, until researchers including Dr. Renzulli showed how much the environment matters, and asked whether we are closer to understanding how. We can't change genetics, Dr. Renzulli answered, but we can change the environment. He described what he calls the three Es: Enjoyment leads to Engagement, which leads to Experiences in more advanced learning. Not every activity will delight every student, but when even a few hands go up with questions, that is the place to start. Interest, he said, is the heart of creative productivity, and the goal is for students to use what they know to create something useful.
Alexandre also asked about isolation in a world full of social networks. Dr. Renzulli saw promise there, describing projects in which children in the United States, Vietnam, and South Korea worked together online on a shared project.
What Dr. Renzulli Told Folha About Identifying Gifted Students
Mattos's own questions turned to Brazil's new national registry of gifted students and whether a country as large and unequal as Brazil can identify them at national scale. A registry built only on IQ or achievement results, Dr. Renzulli warned, would turn away a child who scores 129 when the cutoff is 130, even a child deeply interested in, say, the migration of piranhas in the Amazon. Strong interests, he argued, are what lead children to work harder, enjoy learning more, and create more.
He reaffirmed the Three-Ring Conception of Giftedness he introduced in the 1970s: giftedness emerges where above-average ability, creativity, and task commitment meet, and above-average does not mean an IQ of 130. He distinguished the schoolhouse giftedness that shows up as good grades from the creative-productive giftedness that shows up in what young people make. Asked to name society's biggest mistake with gifted children, he pointed to over-reliance on tests, and suggested we also count the articles, stories, films, science competitions, and performances they produce. Teachers, he added, need training to recognize gifted students in more ways than testing, and he mentioned the Interest-A-Lyzer, the instrument he developed to help surface children's strongest interests.
About Brazil's New Gifted Education Law
The interview arrived four months after Brazil enacted Lei 15.436/2026, signed June 17 and in force since June 18, which creates the country's first National Policy for Students with High Abilities or Giftedness. It builds on the long-standing requirements of Brazil's national education law (LDB).
The law's definition of giftedness echoes themes the students raised. Alongside high intellectual potential, it names intense curiosity, deep engagement in topics of interest, high sensitivity, and emotional intensity. It also recognizes that giftedness shows up in many different ways (Art. 3, II), the point at the center of Dr. Renzulli's answer on the registry.
A National Registry
The Ministry of Education will keep a national registry of students with high abilities or giftedness, using education census data to follow their paths through school.
Specialized Services
Services may include enrichment, differentiation, deeper study, acceleration, and grouping students by interest. School systems may also partner with universities on enrichment.
Flexible Progression
Students may stay with their grade and receive enrichment, accelerate in a single subject or area, or move up fully to a new grade, matched to each student's learning pace and development.
Twice-Exceptional
Gifted students who also have another condition, such as autism, ADHD, or dyslexia, are covered, and that condition cannot be used to deny their giftedness.
Individualized Planning
Schools prepare individualized plans that set out each student's goals, strategies, resources, and assessment, with differentiated teaching, and update them continuously.
Voluntary Adherence
States, the Federal District, and municipalities choose whether to join by signing an agreement, after which the federal government provides support, subject to budget.
The need is real. Brazil's 2025 School Census formally identified about 56,000 students with high abilities or giftedness, a small fraction of the country's school population.
A Country Rich in Potential
"A country like Brazil has an unlimited amount of human potential."
Dr. Joseph Renzulli, Folha de S.Paulo, October 12, 2026 (translated from Portuguese)
The task now, Dr. Renzulli said, is to discover the best ways to develop that potential. If countries want to grow, more children need to spend their time working on their own ideas rather than memorizing information for a Friday test. Sara, Rafael, and Alexandre are a fitting illustration of his point: three young people whose talents show up in art, in mathematics, and in medicine, and who were given the chance to ask their own questions.
To learn more about the research behind his answers, explore the Three-Ring Conception and the Schoolwide Enrichment Model.
The Folha Interview: Common Questions
Three gifted Brazilian students wrote the questions: Sara Manni Gomide, 10; Rafael Kessler, 12; and Alexandre Andrade de Almeida, 19, a medical student at the University of São Paulo. Journalist Laura Mattos organized the interview, which Folha de S.Paulo published on October 12, 2026.
He encouraged them to follow their strongest interests, find other young people who share those interests, and look to universities and people working in their field for more advanced support. He also urged adults to encourage and reward children's curiosity, and explained that enjoyment leads to engagement, which leads to more advanced learning experiences.
Dr. Renzulli cautioned that a registry based only on IQ or achievement cutoffs would exclude many students with high creativity and strong task commitment, such as a child who scores 129 against a cutoff of 130. He argued that interests, creativity, and task commitment matter as much as above-average ability.
Lei 15.436/2026 is the Brazilian federal law, signed June 17, 2026, and in force since June 18, that establishes the National Policy for Students with High Abilities or Giftedness. It creates a national student registry within the Ministry of Education, covers twice-exceptional students, provides for enrichment, acceleration, and interest-based grouping, and allows flexible progression. Adherence by states and municipalities is voluntary.
Introduced by Dr. Joseph Renzulli in the 1970s, the Three-Ring Conception holds that gifted behavior emerges where three traits meet: above-average ability, creativity, and task commitment. It underpins the Schoolwide Enrichment Model, developed by Dr. Renzulli and Dr. Sally Reis across five decades of research at the University of Connecticut.
Sources
Folha de S.Paulo, "'Por que penso tão rápido?', pergunta criança ao 'papa' da superdotação," interview with Joseph Renzulli by Laura Mattos, Entrevista da 2ª, October 12, 2026, pages A34 and A35 (Portuguese): folha.uol.com.br.
Brazil, Lei nº 15.436, de 17 de junho de 2026, Institui a Política Nacional para Estudantes com Altas Habilidades ou Superdotação, Diário Oficial da União, June 18, 2026 (Portuguese): planalto.gov.br.
INEP/MEC, Censo Escolar da Educação Básica 2025.
The interview summary above is Renzulli Learning's English paraphrase; the quotation is translated from Portuguese by Renzulli Learning. For Dr. Renzulli's exact words, see the original interview in Folha de S.Paulo.