Bridging the gap between policy and practice: adopting a strategic vision for partnership working in special education

The desirability of parents and professionals in special education working in partnership continues to be expressed through Government policy and legislation and through voluntary sector initiatives.

Moreover, partnership working attracts significant financial investment. Yet effective, working parent - professional partnerships often remain elusive in practice. In this article, Susanna Pinkus, a teacher, consultant and teaching practice supervisor who recently completed her PhD, describes her research into partnerships between parents and professionals. She bases her assertions on the daily experiences of 14 parents based in four London education authorities and attributes an absence of effective collaboration to lack of understanding about how partnerships between parents and professionals do, and should, function in the special educational context. In order to bridge this gap between the rhetoric of policy and the difficulties that are frequently reported in developing parent-professional relationships in practice, Susanna Pinkus identifies and discusses four principles as being central to forming effective partnerships.

British Journal of Educational Studies, Volume 32, Number 4, December 2005 , pp. 184-187(4)