I don’t know if the funding is still there, but in our county, when we had our students (IEP’s with “variables”), we referred them to the County for “vocational rehab” services. When they turned 16, they were eligible for vocational rehab services. The services were provided free of charge by the County.
The county representative would attend the IEP meeting and would introduce the parents to what the vocational rehab program provided. If the family indicated that they wanted the service, the student would begin the “paperwork”.
If the student wanted to attend college, then they started the process of assigning a “job” coach, working with those students. The job coaches helped with banking, driver’s education, coordination of Community College skills and transition to the universities. They would guide the student but made sure that the student took the lead.
During my experience with them, my high school students worked at Home Depot/Lowe’s, veterinary clinics, restaurants, libraries, Coffee houses, etc.
I will echo @cinnamon1212’s 2-4 above.
My DS had a somewhat similar profile. Brilliant, STEM focused. Inconsistent grades, never seemed to turn in homework. Wasn’t diagnosed ADHD until between junior and senior year.
For her the best fit was an open curriculum LAC (small classes, you take what you are interested in) & playing an NCAA sport D3. The added structure/support of the team was invaluable. The choice of classes was life changing. And the small class sizes means she knows all her profs well.
I was surprised by the accommodations offered by all the LACs she was interested in. She could be assigned an EF coach, take extended time exams in a separate room, have a note-taker, etc. Everything is done in a class by class basis, so she asks for what she needs. Note that she was not in a position to do this before junior year. She grew into the self-advocacy, as will OP’s child.
I will also say, I never once worried that my DS couldn’t handle the college work. It was the life stuff. So we looked for schools where dining was easy (unlimited and easy to access), where everyone lived on campus all 4 years, where she could play her sport and not get lost in the shuffle, etc. Her experience has been a million times better than I could have dreamed. OP, your child has lots of time to grow! I would recommend looking at LACs and open curriculum programs.
Kids I know with profiles similar? somewhat similar? ( obviously I don’t know your D) that have worked-
Lawrence
Beloit
Goucher
Drexel (engineering and coop; for some kids this is fantastic, for others it just complicates things. But it does give a valuable break from daily classes…)
American
Keene (in NH, sort of off the beaten track but the kid has been VERY successful professionally after a HS experience of “he’s not college material”)
Hamilton
Rowan
Cornell
Hofstra
The Cornell engineer got a job in about ten seconds, in aerospace, doing what he wanted to be doing. A VERY lopsided kid. Brilliant when he’s challenged and excited, huge procrastinator on everything else, struggled tremendously with EF in HS but the constant quizzes, problem sets, review sessions, “something due every day” pace of Cornell really worked for him. He described college as a full time job- wake up, eat, either go to class, lab or library until dinner and then more lab/library and then lights out. Tremendous camaraderie with his classmates and some close friendships. Parents think he would have drowned at a less intense program-- the constant need to be playing his A game kept him on track. YMMV.
The Hofstra kid-- jury still out. Parents were VERY helicopter in HS, not sure how he’s faring academically although he seems to LOVE college.
Hope this gives you some ideas. The folks I know IRL seem evenly split on big vs. small in terms of what facilitates success. The ones whose kids are/have been successful on small campuses point to the size/knowing your professors/etc. as being key. The ones at big U’s have said that every semester their kid needed at least one “get lost in the back of the lecture hall” class to stay balanced. Whether Intro Psych or sociology or econ… some lecture based class where nobody cared if you never raised your hand— that was the right balance with the smaller seminars or labs.
I’m going to share some small to medium-sized schools that could be of interest that I’ve mentioned in other threads. I’m quoting them, in part, because those threads may have other useful suggestions for you. I understand that your D is interested in STEM and not just Engineering, but finding small colleges with engineering is not always the easiest. All these schools offer varsity women’s soccer and I’ve added in the school’s division listed in College Navigator (feds’ website) in brackets.
I suspect that Clarkson [D3] in NY would be worth a gander as it is definitely a STEM school. Cornell College (IA, D3) is one of the few schools that has a one-at-a-time model and it ABET-accredited, but only for general engineering. U. of Montana Western is the other one-at-a-time college I’m aware of that your D would have a decent chance of acceptance to (I suspect Colorado College is unlikely), but I don’t think it has the STEM strength that your family would want and they don’t have women’s soccer (though they do have varsity rodeo!).
Is there a region of the country that your D might prefer?
If you are thinking that WPI will be a fit for her, she should consider doing the Frontiers program next year. They offer admission interviews during the session and admit a very high percentage of the participants. They are also in an athletic league that requires very little traveling, which cuts out a lot of the missing time burden of playing a sport. They’ve recently invested heavily into mental health services.
Would a One Course at a Time school be of interest? Cornell College in Iowa could be a target for her. The schedule works very well for athletes, especially those in STEM.
Lynn University has a block schedule and scaffolded educational support.
All three schools are very experiential, which will be key to keeping her engaged.
Does she have an EF coach? I know one that does extremely well with high school/college/transition students if you want to DM.
You said she has a good team, so I’m assuming they’ve considered other meds so that she’s not crashing after school.
I highly suggest getting EF help now, as well as learning to advocate for herself. I have a 2E kid that I was sure was going to need a lot of support in college when I first started thinking about it (sophomore year). He had tons of EF coaching (went to Forman), learned to advocate for himself, and was completely engaged in his learning through experiential courses. He ended up going to a huge state university and is an honors student doing exceptionally well. Kids can change quickly once they have the tools.
My S23 (3.7UW/5 APs/1530 SAT) absolutely wrote about his ADHD in his application essays. It helped to some extent, at least in terms of getting waitlisted at some reachy schools (though he didn’t apply to many places, just UCs/CSU and a couple of auto-admit OOS publics including U of AZ). He is also very STEM focused (astrophysics major, may double major in math) and hates writing essays. College has gone quite well (ranging from B- to B+ in hard classes, and getting better as he’s moved past the weed out courses) and he’s grown a lot, he’s much more self-reliant two years in, and doesn’t feel he needs his meds any more except for exams. He’s even managing to wake up for 8am lectures this quarter. His main challenges in HS were EF related, both with initiation for essays and forgetting to turn in work etc.
The critical elements in his college selection were:
minimal GEs. Anywhere with an extensive core curriculum was taken off the list immediately. Look at this very carefully, since non-major classes can be as low as 15% of classes or as high as 50%. He also chose his senior year APs (eg Latin) to give the best GE credit.
quarter-based with only 3 classes per quarter. Made it much easier to keep on top of his work and even when struggling, he only felt out of his depth for the last few weeks of the quarter, not for half a semester. Then it was on to the next course. I spent a bunch of time planning his four year schedule with him, he’s taking his required GEs as online classes during the summer and is happy to have three challenging math/physics classes to focus on each quarter while he’s away at college.
close to home. He’s only a hour away, which was particularly important in the first term when he just needed a break for a few weekends.
What hasn’t mattered:
Being at a large public (UC) with minimal support. Although we got him registered for accommodations in freshman year, he didn’t make much effort to use them. It forced him to become more self-reliant. And he has got much better at self-advocacy (going to office hours/study sessions and asking professors/TAs for help when he doesn’t understand something). But he doesn’t want to stand out in a lecture.
Thinking about this early can help you “try on” – at least in your mind – different approaches to see what might work best. This was prompted by the WPI calendar comment.
While I don’t know specifically about their ADHD support, Union College (NY), has an academic calendar that works well for students with ED issues. And yes, good STEM. Really fine school.
Earlham doesn’t have engineering but has good sciences and is known for excellent teaching and engaged faculty.
Both of those have D3 soccer. Just suggesting that by poking through these as you’re doing, you can start finding things that would seem to work.
And of course, just keep looking for and honing the strategies that work. Your D will be managing this for a lifetime, so the better she knows herself and what works best for her, the better off she’ll be.
Lastly, reveal or not on the app really depends on whether it strengthens the application. There are a couple of great examples here of how it did. As a rule of thumb, colleges want kids who are going to succeed at their institution, so it should somehow support that.
If I read correctly, your kiddo has just finished their sophomore year. Since her grades are variable, you might want to wait until next year, when you have a better handle on what her application will look like. That said, if you are going to visit colleges sooner, be sure to visit their disability services office. Find out what services they offer, as this can vary quite widely. Some schools will have minimal services (eg give your dau a letter to take to her professors) and some will have comprehensive, structured support services (eg Curry, Lynn, U Denver, Landmark, U Arizona, Farleigh Dickinson, etc)
Thank you to everyone who took time to answer - very helpful, and in many cases, confirming for me that I am thinking about things correctly (quarter systems, low GEs etc.). I’m so proud of this kiddo for how hard she works to stay where she belongs, but also mindful of how utterly exhausting that can be and wanting to demonstrate that “all roads lead to Rome” in terms of life and career. To be honest, Skidmore has exceeded our wildest dreams for our older daughter and we just would love to find the equivalent “sweet spot” for our youngest. We will definitely know more, including after this summer when we see how she does at her pre-college program - and we have the living proof in our oldest of how thoroughly they can spread their wings and fly in college (my oldest is THRIVING at the school this board was so helpful to us in finding). Thanks all!!
I understand that Landmark is not “normative” enough but they do have some preparatory programs that might be helpful, one a sort of gap year transition and the other shorter term “bridge” preparation. They also have summer sessions. We found Landmark helpful in locating a coach for a kid in a private college.
My kid with ADHD went to residential college for one year, then came home to do p/t community college while working (work helped them stay organized), then entered a p/t degree completion program at Lesley and (yay!) graduated at age 32. Of course we know kids with EF issues and ADHD who did Harvard in 4 years. As you know there is a broad spectrum. Basically just want to say that it tends to work out!
I just wanted to recommend seriously considering a gap year. Our oldest has ADHD and had some similar struggles in high school as what you’ve described. They made the very difficult decision to take a gap year after high school. They did apply and were accepted into the college they are now attending (small New England LAC)while still in high school, but decided that an extra year before they started college would be really beneficial. It was literally the best decision. They took the year to live away from us, and gained so much in independence, life skills (grocery shopping, cooking, working for a pay check, getting to and from work on time, cleaning, etc.). What they did wasn’t academic and wasn’t going to be on any kind of permanent record, so it gave them the time and space to take some risks and make mistakes without permanent consequences.
As you know kids with ADHD do eventually develop better executive function skills, organization, time management skills etc. They just do so a bit more slowly, so having an extra year to really work on that stuff has made a huge difference for my kid. And honestly taking some time away from the academic grind to clear their head and grow up a bit also made an enormous difference. They’re overall doing really well in college, but it hasn’t been completely smooth sailing. I think that the year off and away gave them much better tools to face some of those hurdles and bumps in the road and come out on top.
Also, just to answer your original question, they did briefly mention their ADHD in the “additional information” section on the common app. But, they did so specifically because they had gone off their medication for the first two years of high school (long story there as to why) and went back on the meds junior year and experienced a pretty significant academic improvement. Since they were planning to stay on their meds, they wanted to let colleges know that the junior year and beyond academic performance could be expected to be more permanent. The statement they made on their applications was really brief and matter of fact. I don’t think I would have recommended that they mention ADHD outside of that context.
I can tell that you’re a very thoughtful parent who wants what is in the best interest of your kids. Because of that, I want to bring this to your attention so you can be mindful of it (emphasis added):
Your next statement about all roads leading to Rome helps to blunt that, but I just want to make sure your family is communicating with her about family expectations, such as your desire for her to be happy, healthy, and (at some point) able to support herself. If the expectation is that she will, someday, be where “she belongs” (i.e. thriving academically or eventually having a job that presupposes academic success), that can bring lots of pressure.
I recall a family reunion where a family of high achievers had some members speak up saying how they regretted becoming a lawyer/doctor/engineer and wished they would have felt it was okay to become a carpenter or something not as prestigious (one of the lawyers did switch out to carpentry). So if your D decides she really enjoys mixing hair colors and finding products that won’t fry someone’s hair, she should believe that your family would be just as loving and proud of her if she becomes a hairdresser as if she becomes a chemical engineer.
Thanks so much for sharing that your older D is thriving at Skidmore…I was actually just thinking about her and your previous thread a couple weeks ago. Looking forward to following along on your D27’s journey!
Sounds like Union College might be worth a side trip next time you ‘re visiting the older one at Skidmore. Beautiful, historic LAC with strong STEM, supportive atmosphere, and three 10-week terms where a normal load is just 3 courses at a time. Seems to be a lot of latitude how one fulfills the gen-eds, even if it’s not open curriculum.
Bonus for your daughter’s PT catering gigs - the first term ends at Thanksgiving, and then the second one starts in January. December is wide open.
Following with interest – my D26 is also 2E, with very high IQ but also ADHD and anxiety. Both are pretty well managed with medication right now, and she is bright enough that she’s able to compensate and not have it affect her grades too much.
BUT, during the school year I serve as her executive function coach, and every Saturday I have her tell me all of the assignments for the week, and then I help her prioritize. Writing papers is torture for her – she’s a good writer, but she just can’t get started. Yet knocking out math or Latin homework is no problem.
I see a lot of social anxiety, too, and lots of other quirks – so I have some similar concerns about college. We’re actually visiting WPI and Clark next weekend – I’ll report back with what we think. Top of her list right now is RIT – the particular major there that she wants to study is somewhat niche and very closely aligned with what she wants. So it may be hard to get her to look elsewhere even if the structure of the school is better for her.
That’s a great thing that RIT is her top choice, then. They have both a strong writing center and good EF support. I’d be excited that the school that has a niche program in her major also has strong support for her needs.
I’m crossing my fingers for maximum merit from RIT. She has already gotten $24K per year for the Women in STEM scholarship (given to juniors nominated by their school – no one at my D26’s school goes to RIT, as we’re in the south and typically send kids to SEC schools – so she asked her college advising office to nominate her, and they did). RIT says they’ll replace that with larger merit if warranted, but I think they max out at $27K per year, so it’s not significantly more.
She should also get their $2K per year for National Merit, maybe $1K for the performing arts scholarship, and another $1K for an alum referral (surely we can find one alum who is willing to fill out one form on her behalf, lol).
I’m thinking we can get the cost down to $50K per year. It’s still a lot, and it stings a little knowing she could probably go to Georgia Tech (in-state for us, and she’d have to get in, of course, which is a reach for everyone) for $15K.
But I’m a big proponent of fit, and RIT just seems like such a better fit – despite the distance, weather, etc. So to hear that their support for ADHD kids is also good is REALLY good!
Fit is important for everyone, but it is even more imperative for neuro diverse kids. As I mentioned up thread, both of my kids are 2e. I always viewed the college selection process for them as being about where they can get through successfully rather than about where they can get in. We are also in Georgia, my S22 is a physics major who turned down Georgia Tech for William and Mary. Like your D, he fell in love with a match school known to have great support for neuro diverse students and I considered that a win win. He is a rising senior and is thriving.
My older son chose Auburn honors for a niche engineering major. Both my kids chose the best fit school for them both in terms of academic programs and learning support. As an aside, Auburn honors plus their SKILL program for learning disabilities could be an affordable option closer to home if your kid is open to an SEC school and looking for a likely school to add to her list.
Both of my kids colleges had academic coaching programs available to help ADHD kids with executive functioning - as well as other academic supports such as peer tutoring and writing centers available to all students. Neither of my kids ended up using the executive function coaching, but I felt better sending them to schools that had that safety net. I made a deal with both of them that I would have access to their grades first semester of freshman year. They promised they would go to office hours and tutoring even if they thought they didn’t need to. If their first midterms didn’t go well, they would be enrolled in the academic coaching programs. I’d be lying if I said there haven’t been a few bumps along the way, but by and large both kids learned to use the resources available to them and have done well in college.
As much as you can, try to take off the training wheels over the course of senior year. By the middle of senior year my kids were proficient in setting reminders and using calendars on their phones to map out their assignments, tests and study schedules. Every Saturday I would ask what they had coming up for the next week and would make sure they were staying on top of their work, but I was not giving a study schedule or telling them what to do. They could handle waking up and getting themselves to school on time because they knew Mom was no longer going to wake them up if they slept through their alarm.They also had learned to approach their teachers for extra help and always had study groups for those demanding AP and post AP STEM classes they took in high school. The more your D learns these things now - especially seeking out help from sources other than you - the easier the transition to college will be.
I used it to slowly transition them to other supports on campus or off.