I spend about 20% of my time on the road, traveling to boarding schools, day schools, and therapeutic programs. All of this traveling adds up, and in the course of a year I will visit upwards of 100 different schools and programs. Some I love; some, not so much.

This time out of office serves a few purposes:

It means that I can serve as an effective first point of trust between parents and a school or program. Knowing that I’ve done my due diligence, visiting a boarding school or getting to know the clinicians at a therapeutic program, cuts down on the initial research you need to do yourself.
I can feel the “vibe” of the school. Websites and Zoom tours are great at showing you who a program wants to be. Actually getting on the ground is what shows you who they actually are.
I’m building relationships. It helps when I can pick up the phone and call an admissions director and they can trust that I’m sharing my honest evaluation about a student. They've shaken my hand and heard my hard questions. They know that I’ve been on the ground and wouldn’t be calling unless I already thought it would be a good fit.

What do you look for when touring a school?

When I was working in schools, I served on a number of Accreditation committees, the audit groups that go into schools to vet them. We were trained and tasked with checking off all the criteria of whether they were actually doing what they said they were doing, either approving them to continue operating or outlining the conditions for improvement. Each visit was like an ethnography, learning the history and culture, what made that school tick, and seeing the ways the relationships and practices made the school effective (or ineffective).

I’m grateful for that training and for the ability to look behind the shiny websites and fancy words to what’s underneath. On those visits we looked at everything: whether the doors that were supposed to be locked actually were, if the programs were safe, if the academics were actually preparing students to think and learn, if the dorms were well-supervised, if the finances were in order. I carry those same techniques over into my school and program visits today.

Perks of traveling

Of course, traveling has other perks, too. I get out of my quiet office and spend time with other humans – Pennie is a great office dog, but her knowledge of neuropsychology is lacking. I get to visit different parts of the country, experience culture and food and art, and meet all of you where you live. And most of all, I get to see my kids in action – in the woods with their therapists, in the classroom, or on the cross-country track – after all, they are the real reason why I do this work.

So the next time you get my “On the Road Again” auto-responder in my email, know that I’m off somewhere with my evaluator’s hat on, making sure that any program that goes on a list for families is one that I know and trust.

And if you want to follow along on some of these travels, you can come on the road with me through our Instagram feed. See you there!