Twenty-one elementary school teachers from Taiwan and 53 elementary school teachers from the New York metropolitan area were interviewed to compare the structure of talented and gifted programs (TAG), their strengths and weaknesses, and provisions for program evaluation. Results indicated few differences between the gifted students, their work habits, or their abilities. The teachers of the gifted had similar backgrounds in both nations. They were well trained and had completed formal college training in educating the gifted. The structure of the programs, however, was basically different. In contrast to the United States, in Taiwan the gifted programs are formal and explicitly defined. Students are uniformly selected by a multi-tiered process developed by the Ministry of Education, teachers of the talented and gifted have formal, theoretical training, which usually includes between 30 and 60 credit hours. In-service training is regularly scheduled and mandatory for all teachers of the gifted. The curriculum is similar in all of Taiwan's programs and teachers commented on the limited selection of curricula materials. Finally, Taiwan's talented and gifted programs are formally evaluated by the Ministry of Education, but the results of the evaluations are not shared with the teachers. (Contains 36 references.) (CR)