On Becoming One of "Those" Parents

What does it take to have one's child evaluated?  Privately?  At one's own expense?  You'd think it would be a slam-dunk - no big deal; easy-peasy, as they say to the kids in school.


Wrong.


Since any psychologist worth the fee will want input from the teacher(s) currently working with the child, you do need some, minimal level of cooperation from your child's school.  And schools can be incredibly uncooperative ... "incredibly" being the operative word.  What would possess a school to refuse to answer a psychologist's questionnaire, asking such "controversial" questions as: what are the child's strengths? what are the child's weaknesses? how could the child be better supported in school?  etc. Really.  


Why would a school want to turn a private evaluation, being paid for by the parents, with no possible request for reimbursement by the school district, into a confrontation?  Why would they start spouting about "policies" that turn out not to exist and are then deemed "practices" but aren't written down anywhere?  What do they think they could gain?  Don't they realize that they are making it look like they have something to hide?  Are they deliberately trying to make parents distrust them?  What do they gain by that?  By making parents have to beg, plead, insist, bring in advocates/lawyers in order to simply get a form filled out, what kind of working relationship do they think they are advancing with the family?  What do they get out of this?  How does making a parent feel like "one of those parents" help the school?  How does it help a child?  


And it circles back to ... what are they trying to hide.  A parent who starts out with a nagging feeling that they (the parents) and the school might be missing something, and therefore want "fresh eyes" from outside, becomes a parent who distrusts the school, who believes that it is not that the school is missing something, but that it is deliberately withholding information and services from a family who needs it.  The trust is breaking, maybe broken.  What do they seek to gain here?  The evaluation will, ultimately, get done.  The information will, ultimately, be obtained.  


And the nastiness of the process?  So unnecessary, and that will last, and forever taint the process of negotiating and evaluating the services being offered and delivered.  What a waste.