<p>Our son is a high school senior and in the process of applying to several schools including Goucher and Earlham. He has ADD which wasn't diagnosed until midway through his sophomore year, and his grades before then were not great. Once he started taking medication his grades improved. He is disclosing all of this on the Common App. The problem is, his grades this year have gone down again. We are working with his doctor to see if the meds need adjusting, but it also seems that the coursework this year is quite a bit harder than last year. If his senior grades are significantly lower than junior year, do you think there is a risk his acceptance could be rescinded under these circumstances?</p>
<p>I also have a son with ADD, and my question is simple: are you sure he’s ready for college? Are you --and he – sure this is what he wants to do? The answer to your question is of course, his offer can be rescinded, those are the circumstances colleges are guarding against. If he’s struggled all through high school, maybe he needs a year of CC to get his skills collected and have some success before he tries to tackle a university setting, which is very unforgiving. I say this knowing that your son is wonderful and talented in many ways that academics will not show.</p>
<p>Greenbutton, you raise a good point. The only question is, what would be a good setting for him to “bridge” from high school to college. We are not sure about c.c., from what we can see they don’t generally offer much in the way of support services. Also our S has expressed a very strong desire to be in a small school with a strong sense of community where he won’t feel lost in the crowd. These are the reasons he has targeted small LACs with good support services. We had thought also about Landmark College in Vermont, but after attending a summer program there he had mixed feelings. He liked the school and made some good friends, but said a lot of kids had behavioral issues that made him uncomfortable. He has always been mainstreamed in school so he might do better in a mainstream-type college setting. On the other hand, if he can’t handle the work and gets stressed out or depressed, that’s not good. It’s really a dilemma.</p>
<p>I’m certainly not an expert — I agree with your son that smaller, with more personal services, is going to probably work better for most students who are not naturally organized or academically proficient. If there was a local CC to try, that might be worth considering for a no-pressure beginning or a summer jumpstart, but ymmv.
Support services (at least in our experience) can only do so much. Many of the challenges ADD students seem to find at college are not the sorts of things that lend themselves to support services, but again, a smaller LAC might be willing to tackle things one-on-one. Services can get you tutors, testing, etc. but they can’t find the printer paper, get to class on time, or set an alarm clock. If he wants to do a LAC, closer might be better (to render aid and support) and I would also advise (as people advised me after S1 was dx) to take the lightest classload he can, to start, and still be full-time. You really want to set him up for success on his terms, not on a 4-yr schedule or a keep-up-with-friends schedule.
Ask yourself how much you do for him now, and stop doing it. See what happens, and how he handles it. That should tell both of you a lot about how he might manage on his own. My son was overwhelmed to the point of trauma, but then again, he was diagnosed AFTER he started college, not before. Best of luck to you!</p>
<p>I’m really sorry your son was traumatized by college and hope he was able to get back on track. I think you are absolutely right about stepping back and seeing how they handle things. We have friends whose son is ADD and attended a college that has a very intensive program for students with learning disabilities. From what they told me, their son was essentially shadowed fulltime by someone who made sure he got to class on time, did his assignments, etc. I think that is going overboard and not doing any favors for the students because how will they learn to function in the real world?</p>