Yes-- the advocacy that I do with my daughter's school falls into one of two categories:
1. stopgap measures that maintain "least worst" for her, and make things tolerable-- it's all just putting out one fire after another though, and
2. patient, long-term education and persuasion. I have lost any illusions I might have once held that this will ever matter to my own child while she is IN school, however.
On point two, I hold on to one point of pride and one only: in a system of 40K+ kids, it is now routine to evaluate students like my DD for eligibility under section 504. We did that. It took five years, and a lot of occasionally tense phone conferences while I led them using resources from all over, LOADS of time writing and documenting and wordsmithing communications, but they are light years ahead of where they were nine years ago. They are also seeing (nationally) why it is better for THEM, as well-- and I call that a win.
Would that I'd had such success on the GT front. Sadly, no. The stonewalling there is that my DD is too unusual to be a test case of anything, and that most of her needs are out of bounds even for highly capable/high potential students. I tried. {shrug}
