They currently do not have a program in place to properly evaluate children and would have a "snowball" of parents coming in to have their children advanced.
I call BS on that one.
Our state has a well-laid-out path to advancement, which you'd think would generate more parent interest. Our district provides written notice to every parent once a year, and to gifted-identified kids twice a year. When my DD went in for one of the two assessment days, there were 4 other kids there, out of a district of 16,000+.
My DD's last-year teacher told me there were multiple kids just in her class who the teacher felt would be fine with a grade skip. I've spoken to the parents of most of them, and the overwhelming response was "Yeah, my kid could probably have done that, too, but..." One of those parents actually did request a skip, was granted it, and decided to switch her kids to private school because she felt that changing schools was better than skipping.
So, in my experience, most parents won't push for a skip unless there are absolutely no other options that fit their kids' needs, and maybe not even then. Heck, I wouldn't have considered a skip except that it looked like the least-worst solution.
(Mine skipped 2nd, and is currently in 3rd. I will say that writing speed has been a big issue for her this year - really the only academic issue that she's had. But neither her speed nor her legibility is remarkably bad for a 3rd grader; she's just not at the top of the class for that.)
