<p>In our experience and the experience of many parents the disabilities offices are not able to handle the needs of the “typical LD/ADD” student. In our case the disabilities director made no promises. He was honest about what he would and would not do. In our experience the places with the most successful disabilities offices are the schools where you pay extra for the service.
While looking for schools for our son one thing I looked at was how many employees the disabilities office employed. In many cases a school of 20,000 students had as many or as few as a school of 1200.</p>
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<p>As I’ve said on another thread, I wish the disabilities offices could be brutally honest, but I know they have to cover themselves legally. If they really don’t want to deal with a student like mine, I wish they could just come out and say so.</p>
<p>It’s been a week since the OP posted on this thread. She’s either on spring break, or doesn’t like what we’re saying.</p>
<p>Or she’s just reading along and doesn’t feel comfortable in sharing yet. So unlike me! :)</p>
<p>Playing off what CF has said, and Missy has confirmed somewhat… (the whole how much do you executively function on behalf of your kid)… I wonder how many parents look around and justify the degree based on what other parents do for their neurotypical because surely our large public had a lot of hyperinvolved parents. The difference is knowing what your kid could absolutely be doing for himself and what you absolutely know you need to do for him. </p>
<p>As someone who probably did some of this with older D and very much has retreated from the role with two younger kids, I honestly believe the school culture can be blinding to what you “should” be doing and what you’ve taken on as a result of certain systemic pressures. It’s hard to back off in helping a kid and truly revealing where he might need to swim rough waters because it’s just all such a rat race now… the whole high school getting into college experience.</p>
<p>We’ve been trained to not show our full hand and HOPE the kid is accepted to the college vs the college truly being happy to have them. The experiences have pretty much been to talk to this offices in depth after admissions (as there seems to be real fear that based on any revealed LD they’ll land in the rejection pile). The whole process of college admissions is such a mystery to the rest of us, we don’t ever feel we could be totally honest with schools from the beginning and take a “what are you going to be able to do for my kid to make him successful?” We forget in that time frame that families are the customer. So it become even more important to really peel back the layers after acceptance. Do not presume or assume anything before you send that deposit.</p>
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<p>LOL, it would be very convenient if one’s most needy child could be one’s youngest! I’m a lot more hands off with my other two kids (they don’t need the help!) and let me tell you, they notice…“But you did that for Brother…”</p>
<p>Missy - as you know, my youngest considers herself “persecuted” because not only do I not do much for her she can do herself, she’s also now the only child and so she feels all we do is watch her. Fortunately, I have seen first hand the differences a school who really works to empower the kids and one where it’s more a dog eat dog world under the guise of “preparing them for college.” A few weeks ago D had fallen behind in a few classes. The teachers caught it, the daughter took charge of what she had to do and met with her dean and she was back on track before I even heard “boo!” Air bubbles would have been long gone by the time anyone but me noticed older D was laying at the bottom of the pool.</p>
<p>It’s too bad that most often we don’t know what our kids need until we find they don’t have it!</p>
<p>My S is not an aspie, but is ADD and has some executive processing and time management issues. It took some missteps before we came to the realization that taking a loaded course schedule is probably more than he can handle comfortably. If he sticks to 12-14 credits/semester he can excel, beyond that it goes downhill fast, but 12 credits/semester will not get you out in 4 years. </p>
<p>A financial tip for those with kids who may know they will need more than 4 years, look for schools that charge tuition by $X/credit rather than $X/semester for 0-19 credits. By paying by the credit, you’re only additional expense beyond 4 years will be the R&B and it will be much easier on the pocketbook to let them go at their own pace. We just happened to luck into this situation.</p>
<p>Good advice, my-3-sons. When I talked to Mitch Nagler, he said to never ever take more than 12 hours. He said that if the school forces students to sign up for a full load, just to drop one class as soon as school starts.</p>
<p>Missypie, one has to be careful about dropping one class each semester or quarter. Some schools have an “adequate progress toward degree” rule. An Aspie who was succeeding in his classes, but was not taking a full load, could fall afoul of that rule.</p>
<p>A timely brief that popped up on IHE today and I thought you might find interesting and/or helpful:</p>
<p>The report referenced is available here: <a href=“http://www.popecenter.org/acrobat/vickers-mar2010.pdf[/url]”>http://www.popecenter.org/acrobat/vickers-mar2010.pdf</a></p>
<p>"The Impact of Growth in Learning Disabilities Diagnoses</p>
<p>The growth of diagnoses of learning disabilities is raising issues about fairness and some discomfort among faculty members, but these questions get too little attention, according to a report issued Thursday by the John William Pope Center for Higher Education Policy. The report is a mix of national data along with a focus on the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. And the report notes that while the growing diagnoses may in part relate to earlier detection, there has also been a growth in a testing industry that caters to wealthy families who want a diagnosis so their children can gain extra time on key tests. James Kessler, director of disability services at Chapel Hill, said that the report served a valuable purpose in bringing attention to these issues. But he said that, in addition to faculty members who worry about whether some students are taking advantage of a diagnosis, there are many professors who understand learning disabilities and see the enhanced services as helping students. "We have faculty who call us and say ‘I have this young woman who in discussion gets the course, but on a test she doesn’t. Can I send her over and see what’s up?’ "</p>
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<p>Good point, esp. for families just starting to look at schools…if you either can’t pay for more than 8 semesters at that school, or need merit aid that won’t pay for more than 8 semesters, or the school will require a full load every semester, may want to consider other schools.</p>
<p>My son’s major required him to take 18 units a semester to graduate in 4 yrs. We knew it wasn’t happening. All were in agreement, son, disabilities director, psychiatrist at home and parents. He started out with 12 or 13. This semester he tried 15 but ending up dropping a course that I knew he would never have passed. We had him do summer school at the community college each summer to try to get those extra units in. He will probably end up doing a 5th year or hopefully just an extra semester. It will be expensive having a 5th year but no matter where he went he was not going to be able to do it in 4.
My son is amazing at math and considered engineering. As much as I can see him as an engineer and enjoying the course work I knew it wasn’t happening. He majored in something that used his creativity but did not require a huge amount of reading and writing.</p>
<p>Well, HFA should be catergorized as a learning disability, because in many cases, a great majority of people with HFA get easily emotionally overwhelmed with the demand of school life and have lots of roadblocks with communicating with teachers and in that case, teachers misinterpret things of HFA students and that puts the student with HFA on the spot. Which leads to the person with HFA to be overwhelmed with things. The people with HFA who academically excel is 1% or much less. Most people with HFA have problems with executive function, disorganization, and communication roadblocks when they want to express what they need and seek from teachers. I mean as a person with this disability, I have overcame lots of hurdles, including much better social skills, more self esteem, ability to get along with peers, plus being able to drive, go out to all sorts of places and many things. I have to tell you, I have busted my hump off in school for the first time in my life and got almost a 3.0 GPA. I made lots of mistakes during my spring semester at a local CC, but I need to to get a way higher 4-year college transferrable GPA to go to any school of my choice (I need at least a 3.8 GPA in my transfer units or else I am doomed). Just know how you learn, verify your disability accomodations with teachers and counselors, etc. and you will be all set. Make sure you learn well enough from your experiences so you can get the grades you want too. That is what I did.</p>
<p>You shouldn’t make up statistics.</p>