<p>My son hopes to play football at an Ivy League school. He is being recruited by the coaches at several schools, but we also know that he has to meet the Academic Index requirements. He has dyslexia, which has affected his grades--he has a 3.82 GPA and has received As in every class except Spanish and one English class. He got a 29 on the ACT, but the language portion dragged his score down. He has not received any services or accomodations for his dyslexia since 5th grade and we have not mentioned his dyslexia to any of the football coaches. Does anyone know if it would help or hurt to tell the Ivy League coaches that he has dyslexia? How do the Ivy League admissions offices view dyslexia?</p>
<p>I forgot to ask if anyone knows how admissions officers at non-Ivy League schools view dyslexia. Is it something that should be mentioned in every application? Thanks.</p>
<p>Some schools require you to report such disorders. I'm pretty sure too, that if your son has dyslexia, there is a separate SAT and separate ACT he could of taken, to boost his score. But from the looks of it, even with dyslexia, he scores higher than most kids in America. Isn't a 29 on the ACT 80%+?</p>
<p>Lostinbalt-thanks for your replay. A 29 is in the 90%+ percentile, I don't remember the exact percentile though. I think you only need to report a learning disability if you want to receive accomodations for it at the college. My son doesn't want to receive any accomodations (although it would be nice to be excused from the foreign language requirement!), but he does want to get into a competitive school. His test scores reflect his disability, and do not accurately reflect his abilities--that's my opinion but he takes honors and AP courses without receiving any accomodations and gets As in those course and has gotten a 5 on every AP test, so I think my opinion is valid. Will college admissions officers who are looking for kids with straight As and a 34-36 on their ACT test give a break to an applicant with dyslexia if his/her application as a whole shows that the applicanat can succeed at the college? Or do competitive colleges avoid taking dyslexic students so that mentioning dyslexia at all dooms the application? He is hoping to get in on football, but there is no guarantee that will happen and he will probably need to get admitted without the support of a football coach. Thanks.</p>
<p>I'm reading your post to say that you son has a 3.82 unweighted GPA, and has taken a number of honors and AP classes, which would give him a weighted GPA (+1 for honors and AP grades) well over 4 - and he's being recruited by coaches at some schools you're interested in. I know a freshman on an Ivy League football team who had a 4.2 GPA and 30 ACT and didn't bother to retake the test because his stats were good enough to get him in as a football player already. My take is that if the coach wants him, your son's academics are good enough, and a discussion of dyslexia would just confuse things. If he's not an athletic recruit, I don't know what the answer to your question is.</p>
<p>Kluge, thanks for your reply. The difficulty for my son is that the Ivies have an "academic index" for athletes. Your academic index is determined by your class rank or GPA and ACT/SAT scores. There are then 4 academic index tiers and an Ivy athletic team can only have a certain number of players from each tier. So not only do you compete for a position, but you compete for a spot within a tier. My son is at the top of the second tier and the coaches want him to retake the ACT to see if he can move up to the top tier. He does not shine on standardized tests, so we are wondering if dyslexia could be used to bump him up a tier if his next ACT test score doesn't do it. However, I think that the admissions office would need to make that decision, if it is even a decision that can be made, which is why I'm trying to determine whether there is any risk associated with mentioning a learning disability. Thanks.</p>