More School Woes

We have had "issues" with Jacob and Grace's school from Day 1. Things like the kids not wanting to go, not making friends, cultural differences, administration problems (lack of communication), etc. The latest thing was that I received a letter home from someone (not the principal and not Grace's teacher) stating that based on some random test Grace "qualifies" to be in a special reading program. I fully understood what this meant because just a few short months ago I went through the same thing with Jacob. The first issue here is that there is NO communication from the teacher that the testing is being done and that if the teacher feels the child is having a problem - they do not tell the parent ANYTHING. So when I got this letter for Grace, I was shocked because not even a month earlier I was sitting across from Grace's teacher and listening to her tell me that Grace is doing excellent and if she had a class full of Grace's her job would be so easy. I had sent an email to the principal earlier in the week because of another ongoing issue (in Grace's class) - the lack of a class list. And as I am trying to help Grace find friends a class list would be helpful. So the principal called me to reiterate that it was against some privacy laws to give out class lists (kind of not the truth), and I decided to ask her about the letter I received regarding Grace and her reading. The principal said that Grace's test scores showed that she was in need of additional help with her reading. I did not agree with this and I told her so. She said she would send both Jacob and Grace's test scores home yesterday. Guess what came home? Nothing. So today I received a call from the reading teacher (who was very sweet for the record) telling me that they were "releasing Grace from the program" - does that sound like prison to you? They had re-tested Grace today and her test scores revealed that she was OFF THE CHART! The required test score AT THE END of first grade is 40 words per minute. Grace's score today - 65 WORDS PER MINUTE! Seriously? The teacher (reading teacher, not Grace's ACTUAL teacher) also told me that they were going to use Grace as an example of how their system was not working. Well....I guess some good did come out of this situation. When talking over the situation with my mom, she suggested to me that maybe THIS is why we are at this school to begin with - to help them fix their problems. I guess I never thought of it that way. Even if that is not the case, I can pretend that it is, right?