Consultation, Social Justice, and Low-Income and Economically Marginalized Children

School psychologists supporting children and families who are from low-income and economically marginalized (LIEM) backgrounds has been the theme of a series of "Communiqué" articles authored by National Association of School Psychologists (NASP) Social Justice committee during this academic year. Previous articles have focused on foundational knowledge and the integration of a social justice framework for working with LIEM populations (EJ1229463), the intersectionality of LIEM with other identities (EJ1234956), considerations for working with gifted students experiencing LIEM (EJ1234947), and service delivery for LIEM students in foster care (EJ1248159). This article continues the series by focusing on consultation as a tool for social justice when intervening with and on behalf of LIEM children and families. Consultation and collaboration are both considered "Practices That Permeate All Aspects of Service Delivery" in NASP's practice model (NASP, 2010). "Consultation" refers to a school psychologist (as the consultant) providing indirect support to an individual or group (typically an educator, family member, or school system) with these consultees ultimately having primary responsibility for carrying out the plan (Song et al., 2019). Social justice is one of NASP's five strategic goals and is a term that encompasses many concepts. In a national study of randomly selected NASP members, ensuring the educational rights and opportunities for all students and promoting nondiscriminatory practice were rated as the most important definitional components of social justice (Shriberg et al., 2011). Subsequent studies of school psychologists have identified the overarching concepts of equity, access, and respect; the school psychologists' behaviors related to awareness (of self and others); advocacy; and empathy as being important to defining social justice within the context of school psychology practice (Biddanda et al., 2019; Jenkins et al., 2018).