Collaboration or Consultation: Is There a Difference?
For the past several years, the support service professionals (SSPs) in education have been exploring various service delivery models to reach the maximum number of students with optimal effectiveness and efficiency. Repeatedly, educators have turned to consultation as a most promising approach, no doubt owing in part to its humanistic components (what Stringer [1961] refers to as its &dquo;hallmark&dquo; and &dquo;unassailable quality&dquo; characteristics), as well as the face validity of some of its conceptualization which has appeared in print. Newcomer’s article serves to add consultation responsibilities to the role definition of the special teacher, a role which seems to make good, common sense among those of us who consider ourselves to be resource professionals employed by the school system. Yet what we need to examine, beyond the philosophical and theoretical base for the resource professional’s role, is the conceptual framework which the resource professional (&dquo;special educator,&dquo; in this instance) draws upon to implement an &dquo;interaction model.&dquo; Conclusions concerning the impact of such a model will probably be similar to what has been found in the mental health field, i.e., McClung and Stunden (1972) reported discrepancy between the actual behavior of consulting professionals and their reported theoretical principles. We must be clear, therefore, on underlying assumptions as well as the selection of an appropriate indirect service model.