I’m sure that respondents to my original question were just trying to be helpful when they announced that being able to write is important in life (as if that’s something that hadn’t occurred to me) or that the student should receive support and instruction to try to help him overcome his disability (as if variations of that hadn’t been tried exhaustively over the last decade). We are not talking here about the usual range of learning challenges that can be overcome with a little more perseverance or tutoring. We are talking about a kid with remarkable math and computer skills who cannot produce a paragraph of prose if his life depended on it. Presumably if he was unable to digest many common foods and I asked for examples of colleges that didn’t require freshmen to be on a standard meal plan, no one would respond “Well, when he graduates, he’s going to need to deal with all kinds of food” or “MY kid got over her aversion to broccoli. Tell yours to just go to the dining hall and deal with it.”
To those of you who responded to the question I asked by suggesting universities without distribution requirements: Thank you.