@aurora2016 it’s part of the experience… kids pick schools based on their teams… they worked hard to be athletes… it attracts alumni money… and it’s the US college experience
+100
If your kid has severe dyslexia, you know it ain’t BS. It is a very serious burden and life limiter for a kid. Many of the comments here are quite offensive and uniformed.
@bud123 either they knew and are complicit or they did not know and are incompetent. In either case, the adcom and school admins are at fault for not doing their job.
But that’s only one problem with the test – the system of test-prep and opportunity for multiple retakes also invalidates the norming & scaling, from a scientific viewpoint.
I personally think that the whole system has become a proxy for wealth, and I don’t think that multiple-choice format tests are particularly useful for college admissions, beyond giving selective colleges a quick and dirty way of sorting their applicant pool. If there are going to be tests for college admissions, then the British system of A Levels makes a lot more sense to me – comprehensive, content-based tests in selective subjects. Or AP exams – content-based tests that are given broad quality grades (such as AP’s 5 point scale). And a once-and-done – or a least a once-a-year approach. So that would end the benefits of repeat testing, as well as end the crazy competition for statistically insignificant marginal differences in scores.
It wouldn’t end the possibility of cheating, but it would certainly make it harder to cheat and reduce the incentives for cheating.
@roethlisburger You are misinformed. First, a student can’t get extra time just on the basis of an ADHD diagnosis. They actually need documented neuro-cognitive deficits that call for extra time. Second, I question your expertise in autism. You might be aware that individuals with autism often have language based processing disorders, and also slow processing speeds. They also may be acutely sensitive to noises, lights and other sensory stimuli. They may be easily overwhelmed in close proximity to others. Therefore, for a variety of reasons, people with autism often get an individual room + extra time accommodation. The reason for the extra time, once again, is not the diagnosis but the symptoms. Third, loss of use of hands, or impaired eyesight is not as rare as you make out, and may be invisible to you. My own son, who attends CMU, lost use of his hands for fine motor activities during his freshman year of college (This was a severe side effect of an antibiotic.) He needed extra time on exams for about a year, and also required a computer to dictate into when the pain was most severe, since he couldn’t hold a pencil or type.) Trust me, dictating in a foreign language (as he had to do in one class) is no fun at all, and does not convey any kind of advantage.
Comments about people with disabilities, such as they “don’t belong” in certain competitive colleges, are simply straight out discriminatory. If you said such a thing in a work place, you would be liable to be sued. The interesting thing about disability discrimination is that unlike other areas of discrimination, most of us will get to experience the other side at some point. All of us age, and by the time we are elderly, most of us will have a qualifying disability.
@shortnuke Yes I can see College Board really cares about this
I think the kids caught up in the scandal should be dismissed even if they didn’t know about cheating/bribery. If they are allowed to matriculate, their parents still win.
Truly entitled people tend to think they’re above everyone else. The next batch will look at this and think - “I’m smarter than them, I can get my kid in, but I won’t get caught.”
At the very least, I’d like to see the Loughlin girls forced to show up at the crack of dawn for crew practice. I mean they’re on the team, right?
“As mother of a student with an LD (not ADD/ADHD) I’d be curious to see the breakdown of reasons that accommodations are given.”
I would also like to see this breakdown.
Yesterday I read that in some prep schools more than half of the students have ‘earned’ the right to get accommodations.
I also separately read that up to 1/4 of current students at elite colleges were given accommodations when they took the ACT.
Both of those statistics, if true, sound very sketchy to me. Most kids would do much better on the ACT without the time constraints.
Unfortunately, I’ve read so many articles that I can’t remember where I saw those two things. lol
@airway1 yes the US college experience is just great. No reason why this CC thread is so active. No reason at all.
Here’s my question. How did all these people (and presumably there’re 700+ others) get to know Singer? Is there a network of intermediaries/brokers? I’m pretty sure Singer didn’t advertise his business.
Now that’s a sentiment I can support 
I.e. basically standardized final exams for high school courses. (SAT subject tests would fulfill a similar role for non-AP level high school courses.)
But widespread use of such would be embarrassing for many high schools, when it is made more public that their A students in AP courses earn mostly 1 and 2 scores on the AP tests.
@calmom You may be right about the limitations of the test design. My point is, whatever you choose to design, take time pressure out of the equation. That will allow the kids to succeed or fail based on their knowledge and not on their speed of reading or calculation. It will remove a huge avenue for cheating and it will remove the stigma from many of the kids who need accommodations.
This was on page 29 of the affadavit that went with the indictment and I’m curious. Caplan is/was the lawyer and head of Willkie Farr & Gallagher in NYC. What “law enforcement” did he get to make the ACT give his child the accommodations?
Stop it! You are giving them ideas for a new reality show: “What I could have been at USC!”
It was the FBI. At this point in the investigation, they were essentially running a sting operation. They asked the ACT organization to cooperate and they did.
You can see other evidence of a sting operation in the Affidavit, such as
There actually wasn’t anything going on with Harvard in this situation. The FBI just wanted to see how WILSON would respond, which he did by wiring $500,000 to the Key Worldwide Foundation.
Was the ACT then informed of the reasons for the sting? (that is, did the FBI inform the ACT that they were investigating a possible cheating problem involving a specific proctor or center?)
@gumbogal
The dismissiveness is what really bothers me. My daughter did extremely well on state testing before middle school, and that was used as a reason why she shouldn’t qualify for a 504 plan. Her orthogonal scores hit a plateau, showing zero improvement after 5th grade, but she was still in the top category (moved from top of that category to the lower margin. The School Principal (a former reading coach) inserted herself into the discussion and declared that a student who did that well couldn’t possibly have a learning disorder - I was overestimating her potential. Never mind that her school was on probation with the state due to the scores of the special ed population. The corollary of her statement was that a student with a learning disability couldn’t possibly do well…When I did in fact pay for outside testing, she submitted a school report that implied I was an overzealous parent, which weighed heavily in the evaluation.
Not saying these two things are equal, but how many of you have fake “emotional support” certifications for your dog? I don’t but I sure get mad when I see people with them.
@goodjob “but how many of you have fake “emotional support” certifications for your dog?”
we don’t have that, but we do have a disabled parking placard, and while the disability my H lives with is not immediately apparent, it is real and debilitating. While we rarely use a disabled spot, unless my H is having a particularly bad day,the abuse we have had to endure when people assume we are scamming, is unbelievable.