My oldest is working on her graduate school applications this week. She is a strong applicant, but a couple of weaker points are explained by her autism, learning disabilities and very slow processing speed.
One of her first choices highly values diversity and admitting students who have been traditionally underserved. I’m not sure if Autism would fall into this category.
We are not trying to find some justification to admit a student who isn’t qualified, but if she already, clearly meets the admission requirements, would learning differences be considered an educational disadvantage and fall under the school’s plan for diversity?
Ask the school to get the definitive answer. Any advice here will not really answer your question. Good luck to her. Kudos. You seem to have done a good parenting job for her to be so successful. I’m sure it has been a long road- you did it with a soon to be college grad looking to her future.
My kid struggled with whether to reveal her LD in grad school apps. In the end she didn’t, although she said something about it in one interview — and didn’t get into that school, where I think she was on the cusp of getting an admission. Grad school admissions (especially for PhD students) are really in the hands of a small group of faculty, with some overarching limits (like GPA minimums) from the university. I would not count on an autism admission to help her app, honestly.
I’d say don’t disclose. The people who would admit your daughter want to hear feel-good stories about how the applicant overcame disadvantages, but don’t want to hear even a whiff of some issue that might cause them problems if they chose her. She shouldn’t give them an excuse to say no.
I’ll say one more thing. She should be realistic about where she applied given her actual stats. My kid had a wide range of schools, and ended up at a school with a solid program with decent funding (she can live on it), but in a less than ideal location (but it also has the benefit of a low cost of living). There is a tendency for applicants to “cluster” toward very top schools in grad school apps. Be strategic about considering other programs that aren’t as flashy.
Grad school is more about being ready to hit the ground running. Depending on whether this an academic program or pre-professional, having a defined research interest or leaning and some record with that. Not the back story about overcoming disadvantages.
But the best resource is current professors she works with who are in this same field. They’re key for advice and LoRs. Has she spoken with them?
That isn’t what the schools mean by “educational disadvantage”. It’s not that you can’t argue that it is a disadvantage, educationally, for a student to have autism or learning disabilities – it is that the phrase, as used in college admissions, is a term of art. So in that respect, “educational disadvantage” is generally used to refer to students from lower socio-economic backgrounds, who attended public schools which were weaker in terms of college prep. It’s possible that an ESL student might also fall under that umbrella.
So “educational disadvantage” is a generalization that refers to the quality of education offered at the high school the student is coming from.
Obviously, students with LDs/autism can also be attending schools that fit that “educational disadvantage” definition. But the point is that within that phrase, as used to meet diversity goals, the focus is primarily on the overall economic disadvantage which would tend to prevent the student from acquiring the stats and college prep courseload that would make them competitive for admission without special consideration.
Thank you so much for your help. What Calmom explained is what my first thought was, then I wondered if I was defining it too narrowly.
She took a list of 15 graduate schools to her mentoring professor. He narrowed it down to 5 based on where he thinks she will do well. He wrote off schools where he knows the faculty don’t appreciate “out-of-the-box thinking”. He said that he has a friend at her first choice school picked out for her doctoral adviser, and he was going to call him about her application.
The second reader for her honors thesis is looking over her SOP now so she, fortunately, has great support from from the faculty.
I will, of course, let her decide, but I’m leaning towards not disclosing. I’m not sure it would be helpful.
I talked to my D discussed above in post #2 about this over the weekend. She wasn’t sure at the time (although I was pretty sure after she described the interview), but now that she is a PhD student, she is 100% sure she torpedoed her chances at the school she revealed her LD to in the interview. Once she was enrolled at her current school she went ahead and requested her LD accommodations and got them, though. Even that is not that common in grad schools, but she felt she needed to.
Nice that she is getting some help with her list. My D got valuable advice from her undergrad research advisors, too. I don’t know if you can PM yet, but I’m curious what field she is applying for. Also, look at the website Gradcafe — they have some useful resources.
Thank you for following up with your daughter. I also have LDs. I remember when I was graduating from college and going on job interviews. My advisor warned me not to disclose. I told her that it was my test for potential employers. I wouldn’t want to work for anyone that narrow minded and ignorant that would be put off by my LDs. I’m so glad that I got wiser and not just older since then!
My middle daughter was up for a big scholarship and somehow blew it during the interview. It really hurt her confidence, but I kept telling her that if they didn’t appreciate her point of view during the interview, they weren’t going to appreciate it in the program. She clearly wasn’t going to be a good fit.
When my oldest was applying to the honors college, one of her Community College professors gave us a copy of the LOR she wrote. She obviously didn’t disclose, but she said,“M. has some challenges that cause many students to give up or fail, but she never does. She has good strategies and systems for overcoming these challenges such as…” She went on to list some of my daughter’s strengths.
It is possible that something will get mentioned in a LOR or in a personal call from one of her current professors to a colleague at her potential program, but I’m okay with that. I trust that they know where she will do well and succeed.
My oldest is applying to 3 PhD programs and 2 Masters programs. We have told her that if she doesn’t get in this round, we are happy for her to work for a year and then try again or to just find something else she likes even better.
So we will just get these applications in and see what happens.