Helping Families Reach Their PEAK: Partnerships That Promote Family Empowerment

The unique role of parents and caregivers of students with disabilities has led to the incorporation of parent involvement as one of the six foundational principles of the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act (IDEA; 2004). The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA; 2015) also emphasizes parent collaboration and shared decision making as it relates to fair, equitable, and high-quality education. Parent involvement, as highlighted in IDEA, promotes collaboration in which caregivers have a stake in decision making and planning. Despite this vision of parent involvement within IDEA, families often feel as if they are passive recipients of special education services as opposed to crucial stakeholders (Turnbull et al., 2011). Families often report an experience of feeling powerless within the educational team that is supporting their child (Mueller, 2017). Valle (2011) likens the experience of family members, upon learning the child has a disability, to one from Alice in Wonderland in that they often feel like their world has been turned upside down or that they are falling “down the rabbit hole.” These feelings are no surprise as the world of special education is saturated with jargon, systems, and beliefs that make families hesitant to step into a leading role.