A Letter = Action

In the quest to obtain a statement of special needs for my son, his teacher suggested I write yet another letter demanding that the council provide a statutory assessment. I thought we had already begun this process, but it has been taking a long time to get the educational psychologist into the school to observe my son. We first met with her and her team back in November with not much happening as a result. She did not meet my son, but instead had us fill out a questionnaire which determined he probably had ADHD.

Since then of course we were referred to a multi-disciplinary team including the psychiatrist who has made the most detailed assessment thus far, and doesn't really agree with the ADHD idea, but rather more like PDD or Asperger's. In any case, my letter last week to the head of the special needs assessment team, has resulted (we think) in my son's case going before the moderation panel this week. This astonished his teacher and made the school very happy, but after considering the matter, I'm a bit confused. The moderation panel apparently looks at all the 'evidence' and makes a decision as to whether a statement is necessary. However, all the 'evidence' has not yet been compiled, and this is the problem I'm seeing.

The ed psych woman has taken sick leave, ignoring numerous emails and not doing the cognitive assessment for my son. A different ed psych team has contacted me and we (parents) are meeting with them next week. The following week, after school breaks up, they are meeting with my son. So what the outcome of the moderating panel will be, I'm just not sure and I'm getting an ominous feeling that it is premature and will result in the need to appeal and perhaps start the process all over again... I hope I'm wrong, but it seems that when bureaucrats get involved, it just gets screwed up... like too many cooks in the kitchen. I am hoping that the schools report along with the psychiatrists report will be enough to convince them that a statement of special educational needs will benefit my son tremendously.