The Right Type of Support is Crucial in High School

Are you a high school student with a student support plan, or do you have a high school student who has a student support plan? Are you planning on attending college? If your answer is yes to both of those questions, then listen up because your student support plan isn’t worth anything to your future college. 

Often students with ADHD who have student support plans and not an IEP or a 504 have them because:

• the parent doesn’t want to label their child
•  the student is doing okay in school
• the school district has convinced the family that the student isn’t going to get any more services, so it is not worth doing a 504 meeting

Here are my issues with these reasons. First, it is my opinion that not wanting to label your child/teen is not going to serve them in the long run. Your teen already knows that they are different or that they are struggling, most likely in more than one area of their life. Without having a reason as to why they are struggling, students often:

•  turn against themselves with negative self-talk like “I am just not good enough.” 
• they develop anxiety or depression.
• give up altogether because they feel too overwhelmed to do anything 

These responses are avoidable if students understand how their brain works differently. This is similar to not giving your child glasses when they need them. Being correctly tested and diagnosed offers students a new lens to view themselves with so that they can understand their brain and how it works. Secondly, if your teen is doing okay in high school, that is great. Many people with ADHD are highly intelligent, so high school level work isn’t difficult for them to handle.

However, they are probably benefiting from others acting as their frontal lobe. Teachers or parents may be directing them to do assignments, stay focused, or turn in finished work, among other support. This type of support is not going to happen as college without documentation. Lastly, school districts often don’t want to give services to students who don’t appear to need them. Most school districts have a period before a 504 meeting, where they ask students, who want a 504 plan, to self-advocate for help by making requests to teachers.

This practice developed because of a disturbing trend. Some parents are pushing for 504s so that their teens can get extra time on tests like the SAT or the ACT. These students often don’t need support services and have been coached on how to answer questions to get the ADHD diagnosis. Students who need the services are often too embarrassed to ask for them in front of a class full of other students. Nobody wants to look too different, especially in high school. Since these students aren’t asking for support, the district has no reason to give it. Sometimes, the support needed isn’t more than a student support plan would offer. The difference is that 504 is backed by the law, and a student support plan is a school’s way of looking supportive. Here is an example of why the 504 is necessary if a student wanted a copy of a Math book at home and in the classroom because they often forgot the textbook at school, making it impossible to do homework, only the student with the 504 has a legal right to have two copies of the book. The student with the student support plan can be denied by any teacher at any time for any accommodation. I have seen this happen. 

College is more expensive now than ever before — only 5-15% of students with ADHD graduate from college, verse 41% of their non-ADHD peers. This news can be discouraging. Over the next couple of months, I will discuss how to get the proper documentation and what steps students should be taking to get the support that they need to be successful in college. 

If you have an IEP, currently, that is covered under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) that expires when you graduate from high school. IDEA gives students the legal right to an education. In college, you will need to switch to a 504, which is covered under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Colleges are not legally required to offer accommodations, and they don’t provide modifications (changes to curriculum). The ADA only requires the right to participate and not the specific right to education. 

If you have a 504 already, then services may be similar, but every college is different. Some colleges are more supportive than others. You should call and talk to the Disability Support Services before applying or at least before deciding to attend any college. Some are great, but some are poor at giving support services. 

If you currently only have a student support plan or nothing at all for services. You are going to need educational testing or a diagnosis that is no more than three years old. Getting this testing done can take months. Your student support plan isn’t considered documentation of a learning difference or diagnosis. So if you are a senior in high school and are planning on going to college, you need to get started today.