Our daughter just got promoted from 5th to 7th grade for next year. Even though we are at one of the top middle schools in our area, she just wasn't getting enough gifted support. She has been bored in school for years but in the past 2-3 years, started acting-out more behaviorally at home because she was so frustrated. We have her in saxophone (at an advanced level with a private teacher), advanced art classes, and club volleyball. Everything the kid does, she excels at. Our public middle school has a similar philosophy as yours, that the advanced subjects they offer are sufficient (althugh they don't really begin advanced academic tracking until 7th grade in Math and 8th grade for all others). Over the past year, I put together an argument using the Iowa Acceleration Scale, feedback and support from the gifted teacher and regular teachers, had outside IQ and academic testing done. In addition to this, my daughter had to take the 6th grade end of the year curriculum exams, which I thought was unfair given that there would of course be gaps in her learning. She scored A's and B's on all exams and we just learned today that the principal is promoting her based on all of the consistent evidence (first time the middle school principal -- grades 5-8 has promoted a child in over 5 years). So, if you decide to try for promotion, think ahead, have all of your data lined up and go for it. My daughter's needs just couldn't be met sufficiently with the pull out gifted services that she was getting and behaviorally and peer-wise, it was compromising her development to stay in an underchallenging academic environment. Good luck to you and your children!
