Ethics and Practice Management: Consent, Records, and Judgment
Ethical architecture
Know the NASP Principles for Professional Ethics: respect for the dignity and rights of all persons, professional competence, honesty and integrity in professional relationships, and responsibility to schools, families, communities, the profession, and society. APA's aspirational principles and enforceable standards apply when you function as a psychologist. Consent, assent, and confidentiality rest on these: parents consent for minors, students assent when developmentally able, and confidentiality yields only for danger to self or others, abuse or neglect, court orders, or a legitimate educational need to know.
Records and boundaries
Education records belong to the district; parents may inspect and request amendment, and FERPA-not HIPAA-usually governs school practice. Test protocols are copyrighted and secure, but parents may review results and, in most circumstances, records; check policy before releasing protocols. Practice management means documenting consent, decisions, consultation contacts, and data promptly; managing workload, not just caseload; supervising trainees within your competence; and using ethical decision-making steps-define the dilemma, identify standards and stakeholders, consult, act, and document.
Traps
- Breaking confidentiality reflexively when a parent requests information the other parent is legally entitled to receive.
- Assuming HIPAA covers school records.
- Treating a subpoena as a court order and releasing records without consent or legal review.
- Overlapping clinical and personal roles in small communities; multiple relationships are managed, not always prohibited.
Rule of thumb
For any dilemma, run four questions: Is it legal? Is it consistent with NASP/APA standards? Would I defend it before the family and my licensing board? Who benefits and who bears the risk?