No school is perfect but...

The boys are beginning this school year at a new school. I am so excited, it feels as if I am going along with them.
I am fighting my enthusiasm and trying to temper my mood with reminders to be cautiously optimistic.
We didn't change schools because we moved. We changed because after 5 years at our last school, I did not feel my eldest, or our family for that matter, were getting what we needed.
I have listened to the refrain of "no school is perfect" for half his life now.
My teacher sister-in-law often reminded me.  And I get that.
I tried to solve for my misgivings, by joining the PTA to be close to what was going on. I hustled school fundraiser events and booked after school meetings. I volunteered at movie nights and open houses.
The decision to leave was far from knee jerk.
We chose to live in one of the poorest school districts in Massachusetts because it was where my husband and I both grew up.We like our town - all of it. Most of our family is here, a complete and beautiful support system for our children.
It all seemed like a plan until my oldest was ready for Kindergarten.
As a reporter, I covered the public school system's flagging test score results, the woefully high teen pregnancy stats, the classroom crowding. I knew teachers in the system who were and are exceptional, but struggling against a tide with so few resources it's unfathomable.
We answered our concerns with a, "We went to school here." With our combined degrees we did OK, we reasoned.
Still many friends encouraged us to leave to any one of the nearby bedroom communities with high state test scores and in some cases, corresponding lack of diversity.
That wasn't what we wanted.
My friend who teaches in one of the best school systems in the country told me to think hard because I would be giving up one set of challenges for another - the kind heightened by affluence and entitlement.
So I stayed.
And Kindergarten was truly delightful.
What had I feared?
But by first grade angst returned.
His teacher asked him to write with his right hand when he was a leftie. He was teased for paying for his lunch because most of  the other children - given the poverty level- did not pay.
Why do I have to pay? he would ask.
We paid in the office from then on as though there was a secret to hide.
It seemed a little insane. Like I was choosing my social politics over what felt right for my son.
When I questioned his first-grade teacher about the necessity and stress of testing every week.
She said: "This is a college preparatory school."
Really? He's six.
Still we soldiered on.
 In second grade together, with our son's teacher, we discovered his writing was not where it should be. Some occupational therapy would be in order. It took until the end of the school year to get anyone to look at him despite all of our prodding to the administration.
What are we doing? I would say to my husband.
In third grade we had lovely teachers and more questionable school policies.
At 8, he was an old enough upper classman to join movie club. Turns out movie club was showing PG13 movies to third graders - you know the kind with swearing and sexual innuendo or just plain sex like Transformers 2. I found out about movie club after I told my son he could not watch the aforementioned flick because it was inappropriate.
"But mom, I already watched it in school!!"
What?
I sent the principal a list of educational and entertainingly age-appropriate films. I got no response.
The school's solution was to cancel the club with no explanation and offer the movie- club- kids an extra recess.
Naturally, the summer before fourth grade, we debated our return.
He has friends there. 
We loved the majority of his teachers.
 He is interested in learning.
What would it do to him to take him out?
What more could we do?
Was leaving really the answer?
We stayed.
Then one week into school, the Kindergarten teacher's aide told my youngest to "shut-up." The principal told me this was "cultural" and she would speak to the aide.
Despite both boys having bright and attentive teachers, we could not talk to them directly or frequently enough, as was the case with my oldest, to stay on top of any challenges. School policy prevented teachers from writing  notes home or responding to me without going through an administrator.
Test scores from my oldest came back weeks or months after the fact. In full disclosure, he too had things to work on - study habits and accountability can be lacking in 9-year-olds.  But he alone, was not the problem.
I know some will write me off  by saying the move was because the school's curriculum was too challenging, or that I am "Tiger Mom" and expected him to get all A's.
Not true.
 Last year, we had seven teacher/administration conferences. The results were like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day. Each end of term period became marathon home-schooling sessions every night after work.
I felt insane.
We shelled out thousands to a tutor for the study skills we were promised when we entered the school with visions of college prep in our heads.
I am just plain tired.
So here we are...a new school, a new year, a new chance.
When we visited the new school, a teacher told me I could contact her by e-mail anytime. And homework, papers, and test results?
"Oh those come back within 48 hours at the latest."
I can work with that.
As my mom used to say to me when I was a kid, "We'll see."