Sorry to say, but for some people, this stuff is all about status and not about learning. It's so-o-o depressing. And of course some of them create problems for other kids who weren't drilled.
Example: Last year our school had an advanced Math class. Whether or not you got into the advanced class was based on the curriculum pre-test taken during the 1st weeks of school. Rumor has it that some parents who were in-the-loop about this used the curriculum maps to drill the benchmarks so they could get placed into this class.
My child did not even make it in with the first group, so I got to over hear the comments about how X could be gifted and Y not be gifted when Y is in the advanced class and X is not.
As if they have any clue how my childs brain works.
