Fortunately for me, these meeting are becoming more common in my life. This is a far cry from the meetings we used to have.

What I mean by bobble head meeting is that when one person says something, the other people involved nod their head in agreement.

In past meetings, especially when there was one particular social worker involved, I used to spend all my time justifying our parenting techniques, why we did or didn’t do things, and that my son actually did do the things I said. Sammy is quite charming and can convince you the sun is purple if he wants to. I was even in a therapy session where a therapist told me that I couldn't "accuse" Sammy of stealing because I didn't see him do it.

Today we had a meeting that was combination of our normal monthly meeting, along with Sammy’s IEP (Individualized Education Plan) meeting. The initial plan was just to have our monthly meeting, but Sammy’s annual review of his IEP plan was due anyway and his behaviors at school have been escalating so the meetings were consolidated.

This was not a small meeting either. There were several people in attendance. There was my husband and myself, our county worker, the wrap around worker, the in home group therapist, the case manager, the vice principal, the guidance counselor, the special education director, the school’s police officer, and lastly both foster dads. The meeting room barely held all of us.

Sammy is failing all of his classes except for gym and computers. The school officials said that Sammy is intelligent enough to handle the work that is given to him. All heads nod in agreement. The school officials said that Sammy has poor social skills. All heads nod in agreement. The school officials said that Sammy’s behaviors are unacceptable. All heads nod in agreement.

At one point the vice principal asked if Sammy had been in intensive therapy. My husband and I began to highlight what we have done in the past, as well as our upcoming arrangements, and our county worker jumped in to back up the fact that we have worked very hard to help Sammy.

We discussed some of the major issues that Sammy is presenting the school with. The biggest issues are stealing as well as behaviors that border on sexual harassment. An agreement was quickly reached that Sammy is not to have any physical contact of any form with any other student or staff. Sammy is also to refrain from assaultive language, either verbal or written.

Secondly if he is found to have anything that doesn’t belong to him, the in school police officer will be notified and charges will be filed. The school had not pressed charges up until this point because they felt that he needed to adjust to the new school. We informed them that this was not a new problem, but one we have dealt with for years, and that he is currently on sanctions from the court for a theft. Again, the rest of the team backed us up.

There are many parents who attend meetings like this that don’t have a bobble head meeting. They spend the meeting defending themselves, or convincing school staff that the child really has an issue. Some children can be so convincing that the staff thinks the parents are crazy, angry or simply making things up. I had Sammy’s IEP plans for the past four years along with me, but not everyone has that to back them up.

It is hard to go into a meeting where you spend so much time defending yourself rather than getting your child the help that is necessary. No one benefits from this. Your child ends up being hurt because the focus isn’t where it needs to be; getting services for your child.

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