What is an Educational Consultant?

What is an Educational Consultant?

What are Educational Consultants?

An educational consultant is a professional or paraprofessional who is otherwise qualified to provide counseling, evaluation and intervention services to parents or caregivers of children. The best educational consultants are those who are experienced, licensed and trained to work with families and youth. An independent educational consultant does not and ethically should not work for school or treatment programs and they should not be paid by these programs. They should work for parents and caregivers only.

What is the Purpose of Educational Consulting and Intervention Services?

The purposes of intervention and educational consulting are

To provide parents with an objective evaluation, information, guidance and support to address their child's psychological and educational problems.
To evaluate and develop a plan to address dysfunctional and other problem behavior.
To help parents interview, evaluate and find schools or intervention programs that will address the parent's concerns.
To help parents ensure the school or intervention program is appropriate for their child.
To support, monitor and advocate for parents with schools, programs and staff.

Why use an Educational Consultant?

To help avoid programs that are inappropriate, abusive or incompetent.
To ensure that your child receives services appropriate to his or her level of need.
To ensure that your expectations and concerns as parents are understood and met.
To provide you with a qualified professional resource and an advocate to help you make sure that programs stay on task and provide the services that your child needs.
To evaluate a programs performance prior to and while your child in enrolled. Programs care about you and your child will value their reputations with parents and they care about what educational consultants have to say about them. .

When do Parents and Professionals Need Educational Consultants?

A growing number of parents with teenagers are searching for private behavioral intervention and school programs for help. They need help because an increasing number of teenagers have emotional, psychological, behavioral, school or substance abuse problems. Many public and private school are simply not providing the help children need to learn, grow and feel good about themselves. In absence of appropriate supervision and healthy self-esteem, students are dropping out of school, bonding with other kids who have problems, turning to drugs and becoming involved in unsafe activities that feel more rewarding and worthwhile.

There there are thousands of school and intervention programs. Unfortunately, many of these "schools" and "programs" are not qualified to deal with the problems children have, may act unethically, may not be safe or may do more harm than good. Even schools and programs that have good reputations are not necessarily appropriate for your child. Some schools and programs earned good reputations a long time ago, but programs change and some reputations are no longer be deserved. Unfortunately, even an abusive and negligent school acting in a criminal manner can help some children. As a consequence, parent references and recommendations can be reassuring but meaningless.

Many parents make the mistake of trying to find the best program for their child without the necessary information or professional guidance and support. A private school or program will either tell you they can help or they can't help. If they can help, only a few will tell you about a school that is better, less expensive or more appropriate for all of your needs. In many cases, an intervention is necessary before a youth can enter a boarding school. Interventions may involve screening, runaway location, crisis stabilization, clinical and educational evaluation, developing treatment plans, monitoring, and educational planning.

What Problems do Parents Bring to Educational and Psychological Consultants?

Parents are usually overwhelmed with information and decision factors when they are exploring school and intervention programs. If there is a crisis involved, the situation is even more distressing. Very few parents know how to tell if a program is appropriate or not. Research and published materials on programs are simply not adequate and the results of parent surveys are never enough to assure that your child's needs will be taken care of. In many cases, children need some form of crisis intervention and psychological and educational evaluation, as well as a referral to an appropriate school or intervention program. Previous evaluations and services may have been inadequate or incomplete. Parents need objective advice and information.

Intervention, therapeutic, treatment and boarding programs vary considerably and there are a tremendous number of programs. Programs vary tremendously in terms of

philosophy
health and safety
structure and design
student populations
level of supervision
intensity of educational or clinical programs
quality and competence
follow-up support
cost

What are the Qualifications of an Educational Consultant?

Licensed and Trained. A relatively small number of educational consultants are licensed and specifically trained to provide screening, intervention, evaluation, treatment and referral services for both psychological and educational problems.
Membership in an Professional Organization. A growing number of educational consultants are becoming members of professional organizations that require specific education and experience for membership. Membership provides some assurance to consumers. Members of organizations are not required to be licensed or specifically to provide educational, school or psychological services.
Incompetent Provider. There is no state regulation, licensure or educational requirement before someone can call him or herself an educational consultant. Unfortunately, there are inexperienced and unqualified people offering educational and psychological services in the United States.

What Services Should a Psychological and Educational Consultant Provide?

At the very least, educational consultants should,

Spend time with parents, students and involved professionals to gather information to identify the family’s needs.
Provide evaluation, guidance and intervention support during family crises such as a runaway, dangerous or threatening behavior, or alcohol and other drug abuse.
Collect and review pertinent records such as school cumulative records, behavioral records, psycho-educational reports, medical and mental health records and other information that might be helpful in making decisions regarding potential intervention or placement of students.
Research, visit or contact programs and schools that are potentially appropriate placements.
Recommend between one and three programs most appropriate for their child that parents can contact and visit.
Provide ongoing support, advocacy and information regarding their child's progress during placement in a treatment program or school program.
Remain in contact with families and programs to ensure proper communication among all parties for an agreed upon period of time.
Remain with a family through any necessary program adjustments or changes.

How do I Find an Educational Consultant?

The following are respected resources for locating educational consultants

Dated: December 30, 2007