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Why are 38 percent of Stanford students saying they're disabled?

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Re: Why are 38 percent of Stanford students saying they're disabled?

#111

Post by anon84873628 »

swatcoder wrote: post #28
pavel_lishin wrote: post #3

> the current language of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) allows students to get expansive accommodations with little more than a doctor's note. Isn't that... good? What else would be expected if you have a disability, and need accomodations?

That's exactly the dilemma. Offering accommodations to people with disabilities is good. So you do that. Then you recognize that not all disabilities that deserve accommodations are obvious so you establish some bureaucratic process that can certify people with these unobvious disabilities so they can receive the accommodations you meant for them to. But the people you delegate to issue those certificates are... well…

Article about this by Slate Star Codex: https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/12/28/adderall-risks-much-mo...

Re: Why are 38 percent of Stanford students saying they're disabled?

#112

Post by MangoToupe »

lostmsu wrote: post #73
hibikir wrote: post #58

I think there's a non-malicious explanation for a percentage of this. As I grew up in the 80s, there were two kinds of gifted kids in school: The kind that would ace everything anyway, and the kind that, for a variety of reasons, lacked the regulation abilities to manage the school setting well, with the slow classes and such. A lot of very smart people just failed academically, because the system didn't work for the…

> The percentages of workers that are neurodivergent is much higher than usual Is it much though? 38%? I haven't seen one in 15 years across 5+ different companies. > there's a big cadre or neurodivergent people that are just in the line where they are very productive workers anyway Alternatively, it just became popular to label others or oneself that way. And tech elites have nothing better to do in free time. Also…

> I haven't seen one in 15 years across 5+ different companies.

I'm guessing you are blind, yea? Otherwise how could you otherwise justify such a statement?

Re: Why are 38 percent of Stanford students saying they're disabled?

#113

Post by windows_hater_7 »

I go to one of those elite universities now, and I get academic accommodations. I think some of the increase is truly from greater awareness about disabilities among teachers and parents. My mom was a teacher, and she was the one who first suspected that I had dyslexia. I repeated kindergarten, and I was privileged that my parents were able to afford external educational psychology testing. Socioeconomic status is a large part of my success. Even seemingly small things like the fact that my parents could pick me up after school so that I could go to tutoring was something that other kids didn’t have, because their parents were working or didn’t have a car.

Re: Why are 38 percent of Stanford students saying they're disabled?

#114

Post by [deleted] »

shetaye wrote: post #81

Regarding Stanford specifically, I did not see the number broken down by academic or residential disability (in the underlying Atlantic article). This is relevant, because > Some students get approved for housing accommodations, including single rooms and emotional-support animals. buries the lede, at least for Stanford. It is incredibly commonplace for students to "get an OAE" (Office of Accessible Education) exclus…

[deleted]

Re: Why are 38 percent of Stanford students saying they're disabled?

#115

Post by OneDeuxTriSeiGo »

SoftTalker wrote: post #69
kazinator wrote: post #47

For pete's sake just give everyone extra time on tests; what's the big deal? If you know the stuff, regurgitating it faster is a trivial optimization.

How much time is enough, then? Do they get all day? A week? As long as it takes?

Best teacher I had in university offered "unlimited time on tests". Their tests were hard as hell but they were scheduled after the last class of the day and ran until like 10 at night. It worked out to like 5 hours of test time even if most people could complete the test in like ~1.5-2 hours.

The policy was essentially "you have until the teacher/TA needs to go home" and given everyone in university is always swamped with work they were generally willing to stick around and get their own work done until it got super late and even then, even if you were the last test taker they'd generally negotiate a final 10-20 minutes with heads up so you could do your best to wrap up even if you weren't done.

But generally the rule is ~2x test time. The extended test time accomodation is normally listed as "double time" in my experience even if profs were generally willing to give you more than 2x time if you were still making meaningful progress.

Re: Why are 38 percent of Stanford students saying they're disabled?

#116

Post by nathan_douglas »

aynyc wrote: post #78

I don't know about Stanford students' actual disability, so I can't say much to that. I went to shitty high school and decent middle school in relatively poor middle class neighborhood. Now, I live in a wealthy school district. The way parents in the two different neighborhood treat "learning disability" is mind blowing. In my current school district, IEP (Individual Education Program) is assigned to students that ne…

My kid hated school in kindergarten as well. As did I. I didn't get any kind of intervention, and I feel like that set me on a terrible course.

My kid, mercifully, was diagnosed and received intervention in the form of tutoring, therapy, that sort of thing. He still has weapons-grade ADHD, and his handwriting is terrible (dysgraphia), but he seems to have beat the dyslexia and loves reading almost as much as his mother and I do. He's happier, healthier, and has a brighter future.

I really, really hope your friend comes to understand, somehow, that their kid needs intervention, and will benefit tremendously from it.

Re: Why are 38 percent of Stanford students saying they're disabled?

#117

Post by swatcoder »

hibikir wrote: post #58

I think there's a non-malicious explanation for a percentage of this. As I grew up in the 80s, there were two kinds of gifted kids in school: The kind that would ace everything anyway, and the kind that, for a variety of reasons, lacked the regulation abilities to manage the school setting well, with the slow classes and such. A lot of very smart people just failed academically, because the system didn't work for the…

> people that are just in the line where they are very productive workers anyway

Of course, that applies to everybody who achieves a stable career at all.

Exceedingly few people (if anyone) are competent and capable at everything, even when you're just talking about basic skills that are handy for common, everyday work.

Your doctor may be a incorrigibly terrible driver, your bus driver may pass out at the sight of blood, your Michelin chef might have been never made sense of geometry, your mechanic may need deep focus just to read through a manual, your bricklayer might go into a panic if they need to stand in front of a crowd, your bartender may never have experienced a clear thought before 11am.

Struggling with some things, even deeply struggling, is normal if not universal. But once you age past the gauntlet of general education that specifically tests all these things, the hope is that you can just sort of flow like water into a valuable enough community role that you can take care of yourself and help some people.

A lot of modern, aspiring-middle-class and online culture stirs up an idea that there must be something unusual about you if you find this thing or that thing difficult, when the reality is that everybody has a few things that they struggle with quite a lot, and that the people who seem like they don't have just succeeded at avoiding, delegating, or hiding whatever it is that's hard for them.

Re: Why are 38 percent of Stanford students saying they're disabled?

#118

Post by brrwind »

reducesuffering wrote: post #21

Incentives. Did you know that mental health specialists like therapists as a field are entirely in lock-step in giving an immediate diagnosis of anything , because otherwise most insurance won't reimburse? Any functioning individual can go to a therapist and get an immediate diagnosis of an affliction, simply because therapists won't get clients if they don't provide the avenue for being funded by health insurance.

> in giving an immediate diagnosis of anything

I don't think this is a complete picture? Sure, they have to provide a diagnosis in order to bill insurance, but that can be something like F43.2/adjustment disorder, which is not a clinical diagnosis of depression or anxiety. Your comment makes it sound the typical experience is that you can just waltz into a talk therapist's office and be handed a slip of paper that says "I'm depressed." Which I'm sure exists, but I don't conflate pill-mills with responsible MDs, either.

Regardless, depending on the state, licensed counselors are qualified to diagnose mental health disorders, so not sure what your comment is getting at.

Re: Why are 38 percent of Stanford students saying they're disabled?

#120

Post by stronglikedan »

SoftTalker wrote: post #69
kazinator wrote: post #47

For pete's sake just give everyone extra time on tests; what's the big deal? If you know the stuff, regurgitating it faster is a trivial optimization.

How much time is enough, then? Do they get all day? A week? As long as it takes?

Given the context of this discussion, the answer would be "whatever extra time they're giving to the disabled folks".
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