advocate?

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I thought I had an advocate BUT after talking to the person I have found that she does not come to our district because of the issues she has with their outlook/findings on special ed. I have many silly questions. Does and advocate charge a lot of money for their services? My husband and I don't have a lot of money people keep telling us to become our own advocates but really we don'y know the laws or even the disorder as a trained/educated professional would. just wondering how some of you have gotten one and where to start finding one. the only way I have found the other person was that she was a customer of my sister in laws at her hair salon and she knew that she does this.

thanks.....

Colleen

You might try recommendations from a local Autism Society group - if there is not one in your county there probabaly is one in you state (if you are in the US). We had a free advocate from ARC but she was very hard to work with because her schedule was so full. So if you can find a cheap one it might be worth paying a few extra dollars. Or you may have some other parents in your district who have been advocating for their own kids for a while who can advise you.

Colleen,

I would also suggest educating yourself. Even the best advocate cannot be effective if the parents do not know what is going on. I would suggest looking at books in your local library and if your library does not have the books you need, then look into Inter-Library Loan.

I cannot stress this enough, you as the parent will probably be the best advocate for your child, no matter how much money you spend on an advocate

Try www.wrightslaw.org for a great site for advocacy! Pete Wright has lots of legal advice for parents there. They hold seminars all over the country. There is going to be one here in Austin in August.

The best way to become an advocate is to do lots of research on the net. Also, look into forming a parent advocacy group in your district. I am a member of such a group. There are about 10 moms that meet monthly to support each other. We get training from various places and then we serve as parent advocates for our district. We have to do a lot of our own publicity and word of mouth.

We try to arrange for monthly trainings for other parents.

I would suggest asking your Special Education director about a parent advocacy program for your district.

Good luck!!

normally i would agree with you but I believe the best person would be someone who is educated and has their degree in Special ed. I also think that I do not nor will i ever know the laws that pertain. I think sometimes I might be considered ADD. i go into the meetings then i sit there because I am so confused on things.. I tel them what I think is best for my son and they give me every song and dance. I go there and I fight for him just to retain services. but what I need is someone who knows the tests that should be given to him, knows really what services he should really be getting. so no i am not the best advocate for him. as much as i would educate myself it would never be what it should be. I have fought just for them to understand that Ryan has AS. i did not know that its my right to have a teacher who is trained/educated in AS. Not one teacher has been. I found this out by pure accident. its sad that they can take advantage of people who don't know any better. I will take the advice of someone else and call the local autistic society and call them for further help. thank you for your input....

Colleen