<p>Is being disabled like being a URM? How much do chances of admission rise? Do you report 504 plans to colleges?</p>
<p>And yes, I am shamelessly trying to milk my disability.</p>
<p>I think it depends on the disability but you having a disability doesn’t make the colleges look any better as say… taking more URMs would. Rather, I think if you have a disability (IE got run over by a car and are now in a wheelchair) but are able to live to the fullest in spite of it or even overcome it, it says a lot about you as a person. However, I’m pretty sure that only applies if you write about it in your essay, otherwise the colleges have no way of knowing how you have handled your disability.</p>
<p>^
I’m kind of afraid that that type of essay might be so common that it’ll looked cliched and not carry much impact. In addition, I don’t really feel like my disability reflects who I am. I’ve certainly overcome it, but it definitely isn’t the focus or highlight of my life.</p>
<p>It would depend on the disability, I would think. But a 504 is not written for people with severe disabilities in most cases. In our school they write them for things that are temporary, like mono or lyme disease, or for things that aren’t academic or don’t affect academic work.</p>
<p>If you have something like autism, or dyslexia, or a physical disability that hinders your education (i.e. vision or hearing issues), those would be something to write about. But ADD is not something I would try and “milk”. Just my .02.</p>
<p>What if you have a relatively serious LD like autism and yet you still managed to top the school, taking the most rigorous class load and yet getting consistent A’s in all of them? Would this be a ‘hook’?</p>
<p>Why milk it, instead of proving yourself with your positive stats, grades, and test scores?
There’s too much milking these days, and we all have our own hindrances (some more than others), but that doesn’t mean we should milk them.</p>
<p>You’re right though. </p>
<p>Not even an Asian-born who went through mental retardation labels… can really ‘milk’ his unfortunate case even if he gets A’s in the most rigorous class load, plus related ECs.</p>
<p>It’s not a “hook”, as an earlier poster said, in that a school won’t take you because of your disability for their own prestige/numbers game (like URM, ISEF winners, etc).</p>
<p>However, if you overcame that disability to become the student you became, they’d want to still take you, hook or not. That’s where the personal statement comes in.</p>
<p>Then I really hope that the student concerned will write a good personal statement on this.</p>
<p>I think that if you write an essay that is very in-depth about how much you worked hard to overcome your disabilities, you have a chance to go to the school of your choice. Just make sure your essay is well-organized, states your ideas very well, shows if you can write your ideas neatly and clearly. Also, you should follow the questions that the essay requires for the school you want to go to. If you meet the borderline requirements to be a competitive applicant to a school you want to go to, you have a chance to go. Just have a good essay, prove you are involved in your current high school or community college, and you are all set to go.</p>
<p>If you talk about your disability, you need to share how you have not let it hold you back. Definitely do not stress the issue unless you can talk about how you have managed to overcome the problem.</p>
<p>I did write about my disability (deaf) and how I overcame it while tying my deafness to my interests in math and science. I then had stellar grades, scores, ECs, research, etc, and my letter of recs also emphasized how I succeeded despite my disability. Just as above posters said, it shows your character that would definitely set you apart from other people if you overcame it and did other significant stuff.</p>
<p>Then, I was accepted into MIT early action for 2013 cycle.</p>
<p>I recommend writing your essay on something else, and letting guidance or teacher recommendations mention the disability. Our guidance counselor had us parents write something too, actually, leaving our daughter (who has lots of chronic medical conditions) to write whatever she wanted to write about, just like everyone else. The thing is, she “overcame the obstacles” that resulted from her health, and wanted to be normal. She would never, ever write an essay about her disability.</p>
<p>I’m deaf w/90db hearing loss in both ears. However, I don’t think it had any factor on my college admissions (even though it was my common app essay).</p>
<p>why do asians get the hardest treatment –</p>
<p>My son, who has ADHD and is in a special school, is going to write about OVERCOMING his disability in the “additional information” section. His main essay is about a separate topic. So this is another way to go (that was recommended to us by an special ed. educational consultant from a major medical center where he was first evaluated). (I just started a new thread about this)</p>
<p>Oh, this must be done with professional help, I suppose.</p>