This thesis focuses on high ability students and the effects of Saturday and summer courses on their academic and social development. These students who have been identified through assessment are in the top 5% of the population academically. After qualifying from the assessment they are invited to participate in courses run by the Irish Centre for Talented Youth (CTYI) at Dublin City University and other colleges around the country. This study looks at students who have participated on these programmes and their parents in relation to the impact of these courses on their academic and social development. Results show that participating students and their parents have a significantly higher level of academic satisfaction with classes at CTYI compared to school. Furthermore the parents and students perceive themselves to have a more positive attitude towards attending CTYI classes compared to school. Both parents and students within this study note a lack of academic challenge at school and believe that they receive little support from their classmates in relation to their ability. Parents tend to rank their children’s ability as much better than their peers in all academic subjects while most of the students rank themselves as much better in selected subjects. Students and parents within the study are mostly comfortable with their academic ability although this is seen to decline slightly as the child gets older. Most of the parents and the students who have attended special classes for high ability children are somewhat uncomfortable with the term gifted to describe their ability.