Interesting. I was in an advanced program (several actually), but one in particular seemed to focus on how to solve puzzles by interpreting comms. It was setup as a type of spy novel and every week the instructor would give coded messages that needed to be decoded to decide on next steps. One that i remember dealt with "targa battery", you had to figure out that it referred to a Porsche and that told you the next waypoint you had to reach. This would have been in 7th or 8th grade. Never actually learned anything in the "class", it seemed to exist for the purpose of screening for a certain type of thinking.

Interesting. I was in an advanced program (several actually), but one in particular seemed to focus on how to solve puzzles by interpreting comms. It was setup as a type of spy novel and every week the instructor would give coded messages that needed to be decoded to decide on next steps. On that i remember dealt with "targa battery", you had to figure out that it referred to a Porsche and that told you the next waypoint you had to reach. This would have been in 7th or 8th grade. Never actually learned anything in the "class", it seemed to exist for the purpose of screening for a certain type of thinking.