Wow. You have my sympathies. Generally speaking, at least in my career, when meetings go that way, there's not a lot one can do, unfortunately. Techniques that have worked include trying to pleasantly recap any points upon which all agree, refocusing on options (good/bad/neutral) and documenting key agreements, however small.

Of course, that all requires having some areas of agreement. I don't recall the details of your situation, beyond the math posts. Is there anything useful in what they want to do?

This may not be an option, but after a year like that (although in our case, it was masked with private school politeness for the most part), we got the heck out of the school.

Last edited by ConnectingDots; 10/14/13 10:10 AM.