Can you please explain what exactly your kid's therapist does to help with the IEP process?

[Anonymous]

I was advised by a friend that my kid's therapist is just calling it in--ie, not helping enough with the IEP process. Trying to figure out what the norm is.

What does your kid's therapist do? Do they write recommended goals? Do they show up at the meeting and advocate?

If you can be specific, I would appreciate it.

How do you know if the therapist isn't helping out enough (and yes, I totally understand that these services require separate compensation, etc)?

[Anonymous]

Letter recommending certain accommodations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Letter recommending certain accommodations.

That you suggest to her.

[Anonymous]

What IEP help do you need? If you don't think the goals are appropriate or that the school isn't taking seriously the needs targeted by the outside therapist, it can be helpful for the therapist to come to the IEP meeting.

[Anonymous]

What type of therapist? Psychotherapy? Speech Therapy? Physical Therapy? Occupationa Therapy?

A psychotherapist isn't going to be telling the IEP team in most cases. Most STs, OTs, PTs in private therapy have told us they have kids more impacted that ours who don't get services and when they do, they don't care what the private interventionist says. Most carry no weight. Advocates, Lawyers and full neuropsychology reports get things moving, but the carry over year to year can be low and you end up spending a lot of money on that and the money could go to private intervention.

[Anonymous]

Is it eligibility or accommodations?

My kid’s therapist has never been a big part of the IEP team. Several of them have told me that they can’t do that much with school because schools cannot/will not implement what the therapist would recommend. Perhaps more importantanly, most therapists are not actually trained in school-based interventions. I can see a therapist being helpful during an FBA to help identify triggers.

The times I tried to use private therapists to design interventions/accomodations it really did not work. We have an advocate who has a background in special ed teaching and she’s much more useful.

[Anonymous]

My kid’s psychotherapist was a former school psychologist at a different school system. She gave us some recommendations of stuff to ask for but really wasn’t involved in the IEP process. When we hit a rough patch with the school, she sat in on a few EIP meetings. She made a few helpful suggestions but I think honestly that just having someone knowledgeable sit in helped decrease the run around from the school staff and got them to step up in a way they wouldn’t for us. (We were trying to get an FBA and they were resisting.)