For us it was a pretty long process. It started shortly after I went to K orientation for parents the spring before DS was scheduled to start. Between that and his K screening scores, DW and I decided to talk to the school. We talked with admins in special services, the K principal and the elementary (1 - 5) principal. The admin was actually very helpful, and admitted that she had a bias against early admissions into first. The elementary teacher was strongly anti-early admissions. The K principal was helpful (she had GT kids) but was encouraging us to keep DS on track to start K in the fall.

We decided to have DS privately tested. Very, very expensive route to go. In our district the regulation is that you can request early admissions to first if your child has a "mental age" of at least 7 years old (which DS did). IIRC, that was not the IQ test but the achievement test.

We then went back to the admin, she read the results and said she'd support our petition, and then we had to go to the school board to get approval. Because the admin supported us, the board was a rubber stamp.

That's how we did it. The actual decision to push forward was a hard one and I'd probably choose differently knowing what we know know. But that was our process. Your mileage may vary...

JB