Robert K. Crabtree

The non-lawyer advocate plays an extremely important role in the special education process. A well trained advocate (who is often the parent of a child with special needs herself) can provide invaluable assistance to parents trying to make their way through the complexities of special education law and procedures. A strong advocate can help parents to:

  • Obtain necessary information about their child and about available educational alternatives
  • Organize presentations for key meetings
  • Develop effective strategies and obtain necessary services
  • Make intelligent and realistic choices along the way

Advocates need to be constantly mindful of the power of their role and the trust parents place in them. Parents see their advocate as the person with particular knowledge of a difficult system; they rely on that person to have a cool head and to apply keen, informed judgment every step of the way.

The more serious mistakes advocates sometimes make are generally ones of excess -- excessive emotion that clouds judgment; excessive advice in areas beyond the advocate's expertise; excessive involvement in a case where the parents would be better off doing things for themselves; raising parents' expectations excessively; and feeding parents' sense of outrage rather than helping them cultivate a calm, persistent approach. (Please note that the roles of lay advocates and of lawyers are similar in many respects, and special education lawyers can and do make the same mistakes on occasion). Here are some of the more common mistakes we see:

  1. Perhaps the most harmful mistake some advocates make is replaying their own special education or health advocacy battles through their advocacy for other families; this clouds the advocate's judgment and tends to create a hostile relationship between the family and the school system that has more to do with the advocate than with the family's real needs.

  2. Not informing parents up front what the special education process entails so that parents are aware from the beginning of the potential costs in time, money, and energy that will be required, particularly if they are seeking expensive services or an outside placement. For example, advocates should inform families that just obtaining an independent evaluation is not necessarily enough to convince a school system to implement the evaluator's recommendations (or a hearing officer to order them); the family may have to incur the evaluator's additional expense of school observation(s), consulting with the family's advocate and/or lawyer, testifying, etc.

  3. Assuming they know the child's disability and educational needs before the independent evaluation is complete. Also, attempting to interpret testing results, scores, percentiles, etc. without the experience and training to do so. These mistakes too often lead to giving advice outside of the advocate's expertise, setting parents up for a fall if the evaluator's findings and recommendations are different. The parent needs to hear from his/her independent evaluator, rather than the advocate, about what their child's needs are and what services or program might meet those needs.

  4. Raising parents' expectations too high without regard for the real limits of the process, the available services, and the legal standards that apply.

  5. Being habitually confrontational, mistaking an "in your face" approach for dealing from strength and encouraging parents to do likewise. Not only does this approach undermine the particular family's work with a school system; over time, the advocate gets a negative reputation and becomes increasingly ineffective for all his/her families.

  6. The opposite problem: becoming too "chummy" with the special education administrators the advocate deals with repeatedly. The best approach for the advocate -- and for the parent -- is to combine a steady skepticism with a willingness to try all reasonable options offered by the school system, and to treat even the most arrogant or adversarial school personnel with the same degree of respect the advocate and parent wish to receive themselves.

  7. Failing to learn about the child from the school personnel who work with him or her. The advocate should listen carefully to what the child's teachers say about the child and help the parents evaluate the credibility and usefulness of the teachers' opinions and observations, rather than simply rejecting them out of hand.

  8. Not staying informed about special education procedural and substantive requirements. This means being completely familiar with the governing laws and regulations, state and federal, and with changes in those laws as they are enacted (e.g., studying IDEA '97, the amendments to the federal special education law enacted in July 1997). It also means following the decisions that are issued by the due process administrative hearing officers in your state to know how issues are being decided and what kind of attitude to expect from the individuals who make those decisions.

  9. Not consulting with an attorney knowledgeable in special education law at key decision points and on difficult issues of law or procedure; waiting until it is too late for the lawyer to be fully effective.


Robert K. Crabtree is a partner at Kotin, Crabtree, and Strong, LLP, a general practice law firm in Boston, Massachusetts. Among other areas of practice, Mr. Crabtree concentrates in special education and disability law.

Copyright © 1998 Kotin, Crabtree, and Strong, LLP

This article is reprinted with permission. It first appeared, and is currently available, at Family Education Network, http://familyeducation.com/.