Parenting Coordination
A strategy for resolving disputes that is centered on your kids is called parenting coordination.
Your children may suffer in the future in terms of their schooling, social lives, health, and romantic relationships if they are exposed to constant conflict during or after your family law proceedings, divorce, or separation. The purpose of parenting coordination is to help you and the other parent or caregiver make the transition from being former quarreling partners to competent co-parents by helping you to put your children’s needs ahead of your own resentment.
This is accomplished via a variety of techniques, such as teaching appropriate post-communication techniques, providing communication support, and handling disputes over how to interpret parenting plans or family law court decisions.
It can entail keeping an eye on your email correspondence and giving you linguistic instruction.
Parenting coordination can help you manage parenting conflicts after orders have been made rather than having to go back to the Family Court to handle orders that have been broken or petitions for violation.
After orders or parenting plans have been made, it is frequently the daily arguments over changeover times (when do the school holidays actually start? ), sharing of children’s belongings, decisions about extracurricular activities, scheduling weekend swaps, and other issues that cause the most friction between parents.
Parenting coordination decreases daily tension that might emerge over concerns or routine decision-making by teaching both parents how to make decisions jointly about such matters.
The procedure can assist you in managing adjustments to decision-making duties after orders have been given and decrease the possibility of your kids getting into a fight.
The ultimate objective is to support both parents over time so that there is good communication, no disagreement, and no need to go back to attorneys, mediation, or the Family Court.
How is Parenting Coordination different
from Mediation or Family Dispute Resolution?
A parenting plan cannot be created through parenting coordination, nor can current orders be changed through this method. Those issues call for mediation or alternative dispute resolution.
When Parenting Coordination is mandated by the Court or if the parties consent, it is a non-confidential process in contrast to Mediation, which is confidential.
Both of you will be held responsible for your actions during the procedure to make sure the procedure leads your family away from communication marked by excessive conflict and toward co-parenting.
What a Parenting Coordinator is not
Despite the fact that Parenting Coordinators bring their professional talents to their employment,
They are not a family conflict resolution professional, an investigator, an arbitrator, a mediator, a counselor, a lawyer, or a writer of family reports.
It is inappropriate for such professionals to serve as your parenting coordinator if they have previously worked with your family.
In Australia, choices when parents cannot agree are not made by parenting coordinators.
Why should we use the Parenting Coordination process?
The Parenting Coordination process:
assists you to resolve your disputes outside of the family law courts, reducing expensive legal fees
helps your family through disagreements and conflict
reduces the harmful effects of conflict, which can threaten the well-being and future outcomes of your children
reduces the likelihood of future contravention applications by dealing with misunderstandings and filling in the ‘gaps’ in orders or parenting plans
reduces the need for ongoing involvement of your lawyers having to help you resolve disputes about the interpretation of your family law orders or parenting plan
What exactly does a Parenting Coordinator do?
A Parenting Coordinator may be ordered by the court or agreed in circumstances which can include:
You are experiencing ongoing disagreements or arguments about the implementation of orders, parental responsibilities, or obligations. There is a history of ongoing conflict between you which has had (or is likely to have) a negative impact on your children. The parenting schedule in the family law orders or parenting plan requires frequent adjustments or is unclear your child has a medical or psychological condition or disability that requires frequent decisions to be made about their treatment