Reply to 504 Plan. Put in place now for a senior? Please help a newbie out.

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Set it now so she can apply to get extra time on the SATs if needed. [/quote]

Too late, the OP's child is 17, I would guess a rising senior. The College Board is much more strict with accommodations when they have been added so late.  It i such easier if the applicant can show that they need and have received accommodations for years.  My DC had IEP accommodations since 2nd grade and on all state tests.  He had a history.  He received all the accommodations for which he asked and within 2 weeks of applying.  [/quote]

SAT accommodations applications have changed in the last year or so.  I personally have a rising senior who took the SATs and PSATs unaccommodated in the fall of Jr year and scored over 1400.  Received a 504 plan in Spring of Jr year.  Retook SATs unaccomodated in June scoring even higher. Applied for SAT2 accomodations in June, received them by July and will test with accommodations in August as a rising Sr.   So we are an example of high scorer, late 504 plan and not a long history of accommodation but receiving swift SAT accommodations.   Much depends on the specific facts of your case and the documentation of your disability and its effects.  Please apply to CB for SAT accoms immediately after you are granted 504 plan.  The worst that can happen is they say no, and then you can still appeal/correct.
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Posts like this one is why extra time on SAT is seen as a way for white, upper middle class/wealthy kids to get an unfair advantage. A SAT score of 1400 is already in the 96th percentile rank. [/quote]

I agree. Attitudes like this and the OP are what increases stigma against our kids who legitimately need extra time and accommodations and have needed them since elementary school. If the OP's child has done well enough without accommodations to be targeting top schools, she's clearly doing just fine.[/quote]

I am the PP whom you criticize.  I am going to respond to you because it is clear that you have an incorrect understanding of the law around disability accommodation and the current process of getting accommodations in school (504 or IEP) and getting accommodations on the SAT or ACT or other tests.

First, attitudes like YOURS are what increase stigma.  You have felt free to criticize my child as some kind of cheater or faker or gaining "unfair advantage" by implying that your child "legitimately" needs extra time and mine does not.  You do not know my child's medical history.  You are substituting your judgement for the judgment of doctors and neuropsychiatrists and an entire team of teachers, administrators, school nurse, school psychologist, etc.  who reviewed my child's file and decided she qualified for a 504 plan with extra-time.  When you substitute your own judgement for those who are far more qualified than you, YOU are perpetuating stigma.

It is not necessary for a child to demonstrate need since elementary school, as your child has.  There are many disabilities that arise in adolescence and are not lifelong.  Anything can happen in life -- a car accident that occurs in HS which leaves brain damage.  A newly diagnosed chronic illness which may be disabling itself or whose treatment may be disabling (like cancer).  Do you think a child diagnosed with cancer who didn't need or get accommodations their junior year should be denied accommodations their senior year?  A med change that causes difficult to manage side effects.  A chronic illness that has periods that worsen. I could go on, but I think you see the point.  YOU are creating stigma by insisting that the only people that could possibly be disabled are those who have been disabled since youth.  In fact, what I realized with my DC is that we are all only "temporarily abled;" fate leaves us only 1 step away from becoming disabled at any moment.

You also imply that a child who is already "doing well enough" or is already a high achiever is not entitled to any kind of disability accommodation.  That is wrong under the law and contributes to the stigma of disability by creating a situation where disabled students who are bright or work doubly hard as a normal student are left without accommodations.  Kids with high IQs are not required to drop all advanced classes and score below "C" before they have access to accommodations.  Similarly, what a child scored previously on an SAT is irrelevant to a current request for accommodations.  Disabled, high achieving kids are not required to work twice as hard as everyone else to maintain their achievement. Disabled kids are not required to fail first to get accommodation.  While many families do encounter this attitude in the IEP or 504 process, it is ILLEGAL. It is an incorrect application of the legal determination of disability. If you encounter it, you should challenge it.

Finally, it's clear that you know NOTHING about the current SAT accommodation process. In fact, SAT has long had a discriminatory accommodation request process in place.  They USED TO require that an applicant demonstrate a long history of accommodation before they would grant accommodations on the test.  This discriminated against all those disabled students who acquired their disability more recently, as I illustrated above.  In the fall of 2016, the DOJ Civil Rights Division put testing companies on notice that their accommodation policies were inconsistent with their obligations under civil rights laws like the ADA and Section 504.  ACT and SAT BOTH changed their accommodation process, and SAT, in particular, announced that they would automatically provide testing accommodations consistent with what was on a students IEP, 504 or private school plan.   You are NOT correct that there has to be a history of accommodation.  A kid can have an accident or illness the spring of their senior year that might require accommodation on the AP exam or other standardized test.  Also, the kids personal plans matter -- maybe a child is going to take a gap year or whatever, and still wants to take the SAT again. Maybe the child was ill during earlier testing opportunities.  There are many reasons a student could seek late accommodations.

For those that want more information, please look here:

https://www.collegeboard.org/students-with-disabilities/whats-new

https://www.applerouth.com/blog/2016/12/15/sweeping-changes-to-sat-and-act-accommodations/

https://www.ada.gov/regs2014/testing_accommodations.html

A wide variety of discriminatory college testing and professional testing barriers have been struck down by the last 20 years of history of lawsuits and work by the DOJ.  That benefits us all, and parents of SN students should not sit in judgment of who is worthy of disability accommodations.

OP has a child who is dealing with two illnesses -- ADHD and a blood disorder.  There are any number of reasons why a senior might now need accommodation -- perhaps a med change is affecting performance, perhaps the hereditary disorder is worsening, perhaps people previously interpreted poor performance as "lack of motivation" or "lack of aptitude"  but recent diagnosis and testing reveals weaknesses due to illness.

OP might also want to request accommodations with an eye to future academic and professional performance and testing requirements.  An ADHD child might be able to manage a 2 hour final exam but not an 8 hour professional exam.  Or a child might be able to offset 1 bad final exam in HS with a series of grades on a semester's worth of homework, quiz and other grades, whereas in the college environment, where there may be only 1 or 2 grades in a class at most, it is really important that those tests are accommodated.

OP, the 504 process should not take any longer than the IEP process (even though there is no specific time requirement in the law), so that's 30 days to determination and another 60 max to create a plan.  In fact, under the ADA, the school may be required to immediately put in place a "health plan" with any necessary accommodations (which can include extra time, and other testing accommodations).

In any case, that is for OP to judge, not you judgmental SN moms.

Also, judgmental SN moms -- your reading comprehension sucks.  I said my DD scored well on the SAT, unaccommodated.  She is not re-taking the SAT, because she was well when she took it both times.  We requested accommodations for the SAT2, which is an entirely different test, because she had an intervening medical complication.  We did not request accommodations for DD to "game" her SAT score.  Your inaccurate assumptions hurt all SN kids. [/quote]

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