Loy, our school, which is a magnet with full GT classes have the "set curriculum" too. I might may be wrong, but like I posted before, I really don't see any differentiation for outliers (and I volunteered in my DS's 3rd classroom quite a bit last year). I also get the feeling that most are happy to have gotten into the school and don't rock the boat too much and tend to supplement at home with Kumon, etc. This is what I gathered from chatting to many parents. I often feel like I am viewed as a crazed tiger mom by the school when requesting advocacy for DD and advocacy is not something I am entirely comfortable doing.