My assumption on the whole asperger's thing with the neuropsych is that if the school accepts and asperger's or autism spectrum diagnosis the kids are automatically required to receive a whole list of services (as require by state law)
No, diagnosis does not determine services. There should be a detailed process of evaluation that determines your DS's educational needs, and then for each need a strategy is determined to address that need. You should make very sure all the needs are identified during the school's eval and written in their report, as without that documentation you can't get the services.
I can see how a cash-strapped school would want to push back on asperger's diagnoses specifically because it's such a borderline-type of call.
Except often it isn't. I hope your neuropsych will do the ADOS-- there really are standardized tests that identify autism traits.
DH and I are both leery of the ED label and it following him through his school career.
I am not actually usually leery of labels, or the "following through school career" thing. A label is sometimes helpful in spelling out what the challenge is and why-- it helps teachers and school staff understand what they are dealing with, and helps you know what you are working on and why it's hard. Knowing the true name for a challenge is better than not knowing.
Here my real concern is that an incorrectly applied label can cause new problems. Everything you've said about your DS sounds more like AS than like ED to me; if I'm wrong (internet diagnosis is worth zero) and he's ED, you'll get him the help he needs, but you definitely want to know what you're dealing with (correct label) before you start making major treatment and placement decisions.
DeeDee
