In broader terms, should a school's demographics (or perhaps standardized testing scores) be taken into account when deciding whether/how to advocate on behalf of your child?
My answer is - it depends.
I do think that the closer a kid is to the mean of the classroom the easier it is going to be for a teacher to accommodate. I don't necessarily mean easy as in they don't have to do anything but just that it might be possible for a good teacher that is willing to do it. I have no idea what the average IQ would be in your neighborhood but I suspect you would have far greater issues if you were in a school where their average is below 100.
There are a few things that I think will impact just how much advocacy will be required
1. teachers - our school board raves about their amazing differentiation and how they integrate just about everyone into the class, etc, etc. In practice there is a WIDE variation on what actually happens in a class. If you end up with a teacher that is amazing at differentiating/compacting/pre-testing/etc then count yourself lucky.
2. the child's personality - do they fit the stereotype of a gifted kid (ie. quick and high achieving) Kids that have LD's and/or shut down and refuse to do work add to the challenge because they don't always fit the mold and teachers don't recognize the need.
3. other parents - there are a few stories on here where *every* parent in the school is advocating for advanced work for their special snowflake and people have had a hard time because the school assumes that your child is exactly the same as all of the others and you are just another parent like the others.
4. asynchronous - some kids are more asynchronous than others. There are kids that are MG that might do some subjects at a higher level and maybe some at a lower level. The lower level ones might end up blending well in an above average classroom while the higher ones will probably need advocacy to be at the right level.
I base this loosely on our experience this year with DS. This year is the first that he is happy and that I haven't had to advocate and a big reason is that he is now in a congregated class where the average is closer to his level. Entry is solely based on one of FSIQ/GAI/VCI scores being above a certain level. He is still at least an SD above the cut off but I suspect he isn't alone. The teacher still has to differentiate like crazy because there are a lot of very asynchronous and/or 2e kids in the class but it is a million times better than his previous school. That said, the math still isn't close to what he could do and there are many amazing things that I read about here that I'm envious of but he's happy so we're happy for now.
