Your story is so similar to mine that I had to post. We are also new to this board after getting back EXPLORE results for dd11(she got a perfect score in both parts of Reading and English and well above average on Math and Science.) She has also been identified since 2nd grade in a district that does little more than the red folder you speak of in your post. Although, they have a G/T curriculum it is up to each teacher to implement and is not enforced. In fact, we are not even allowed to request above grade level curriculum/skipping a grade, as they feel this would leave nothing for the next year's teacher to work with. What is highly pushed though is teaching the state academic test and the criteria that are on that(yuck!). We have worked within/fought within this system for 3 years now and have recently made the decision to homeschool next year based largely in part on the EXPLORE results and our dd growing frustration/boredeom with school.
To your final question, we do show our daughter her testing scores because I feel it validates what she already feels which is boredom and frustration with her situation. I'm not sure if it encourages her to realize her potential but I think it does help her to know why we advocate so strongly for her to be challenged and why we make the decisions we do regarding her education. I completely understand the disillusionment with school and the 'regression', we have definitely seen it in her this past year.
On a side note, we too have an extremely bright younger sibling dd9, that the school would like to test for GT. And, she wouold probably qualify but we've have held off due to the school situation.
It's really a sad situation when the public school system is so scared to address the needs of this group of children. Not sure if this helps any, but just wanted you to know you are not alone!
Heather
