When parents of prospective Ivy League players learn that other students have a subtly “unfair” advantage over their children, they become furious.
In an effort to “level the playing field” with their peers, students with medical and mental health challenges have been given extra time and specific accommodations to finish the SATs and ACTs for decades.
However, parents and students are now going to considerable measures to obtain adjustments that may not be necessary.
Among the “disabilities” that have won kids accommodations at prestigious high schools and universities are anxiety, ADHD, irritable bowel syndrome, gluten sensitivity, endometriosis, and night terrors.
Every year, more and more parents call Laurie Kopp Weingarten, a college entrance consultant, about modifications, she told the Daily Mail.
“I’ve heard parents describe the process as becoming a new form of “pay-to-play,” and I’ve also heard concerns about families “gaming” accommodations—particularly on time-sensitive exams like the ACT,” Weingarten continued. “The controversy centers more around concerns that, in some communities, accommodations may be pursued because families perceive extended time as a competitive advantage.”
Adarsh Mudgil, a dermatologist whose daughter is currently enrolled at the University of Virginia, claimed he saw the pattern when she was taking the ACT and said, “It’s cheating.” It disadvantages our children.
In order to obtain concessions, such as extra time for tests that many do not genuinely require, parents and students are going to considerable measures. A file picture of pupils doing tests
Elsa Johnson, a senior at Stanford University, said that nearly 40% of her peers are accommodated. “You’d be stupid not to game the system,” she acknowledged.
At least sixty kids at his daughter’s prestigious Long Island high school received extra time after taking the test without accommodations.
Last month, he talked about the matter in an episode of his podcast titled “Special accommodation or cheating?”
Many, he claimed, “don’t really fit the criteria to receive those accommodations because they hired some private psychologist or private testing and paid $20,000 to get whatever documentation they need to receive special accommodations from the school district.” “All of these special accommodations that students are receiving really is in my mind akin to cheating,” he said. You don’t have more accommodations in the actual world, thus it’s wrong and cheating the system. It’s unsettling to consider that we are raising a generation that just won’t be able to function well under duress.
“Life is hard” and “it should be hard,” he continued. Before entering the cockpit, he asked guests to consider whether they would want to fly in a plane where the pilot had been granted extra time or special accommodations.
The number of high school pupils using accommodations for college admission examinations is increasing.
The percentage of students needing accommodations increased from 4% to 7% since 2013, despite the fact that exams such as the ACT require a “demonstrated history” of accommodation needs or a modified curriculum.
At least sixty pupils at his daughter’s school received special accommodations, according to father and dermatologist Adarsh Mudgil.
Over the past ten years, there has been an increase in the number of students requesting special accommodations for the SAT and ACT.
Over the past ten years, the SAT, which is said to be more forgiving, has increased from two percent to six percent.
When a student submits their test results, the majority of universities are unaware of whether or not they obtained accommodations.
Examples of exceptions include being given time and a half to finish tests, having many restroom breaks, and completing the test in a different room.
Mudgil described the 40% of Stanford University students who claim a disability as “egregious” in his podcast.
While acknowledging that some children do require special accommodations, Mudgil called it “insane” that 40% of students receive them.
Weingarten continued, “I believe the majority of families support accommodations for students who truly need them.”
Elsa Johnson, a senior at Stanford University, is among the students who have registered with the Office of Accessible Education and is candid about how simple it was for her.
According to Elsa Johnson in The Times, “one of the most prestigious universities in the US offers perks to those who say they have ADHD, night terrors, even gluten intolerance.””You would be foolish if you didn’t manipulate the system.”
Every year, Laurie Kopp Weingarten, a college admission adviser, says she receives an increasing number of inquiries regarding accommodations.
Extra accommodations for students might range from having their own room in a hostel to having more time to finish tests.
She reported her actual endometriosis diagnosis as a disability after learning that a friend had falsely claimed a condition in order to receive privileged housing.
Johnson claimed she received more accommodations than she knew how to handle during a 30-minute Zoom conference.
“I probably didn’t even need a doctor’s note to get these exemptions because I was met with so little skepticism or questioning,” she remarked. “I’m sure I could have gotten nearly any accommodation I requested if I had been more assertive.”
She received solitary residence in her dorm, additional absences, and a 15-minute tardy tolerance.
According to her, some students claim to have “night terrors,” while others claim they “get easily distracted” or “can’t live with others.””One guy I know was given a single room because he has to wear contacts at night. I’ve heard of a girl who was gluten intolerant and received a single.
Many students believed they had little choice but to exploit the system since it is so simple to “game,” as Johnson described it.
“We have determined that our previous practice did not accurately reflect the number of students who are actually receiving accommodations, and we plan to correct this in our IPEDS reporting moving forward,” a Stanford spokesperson told the Daily Mail in response to recent reports of the school’s lax accommodations policies.
“Going forward, Stanford intends to amend the way in which it reports this data to IPEDS in order to accurately reflect the number of students who are in fact receiving academic accommodations as of each fall term,” the Stanford University representative told the Daily Mail.
For instance, compared to 33.51 percent of undergraduates who filled out an initial intake form with OAE, we would report that 12.5 percent of undergraduates were receiving academic accommodations for autumn 2025.
There are more elite universities with this problem than Stanford.
Students at Yale are “incentivized” to take advantage of any concessions available to them, a professor of psychology and cognitive science told the Atlantic.
Brian Scholl stated, “We know that people will act as they are incentivized to act.”
“And the students have every incentive to have as many additional accommodations as they can in any situation.”
“If we want our grades to be meaningful, they should reflect what the student is capable of,” said Steven Sloman, a cognitive science professor at Brown who told the Atlantic that accommodations prevented results from truly reflecting a student’s genuine talents.
At the University of Chicago, almost 13% of students enrolled with the Student Disability Service. “Once they’re past Brown and off in the real world, that’s going to affect their performance.”
Over 18% of students receive accommodations for their housing or exams, according to the Brown Daily Herald.
Professors like Juan Collar, a professor of physics at the University of Chicago, have discovered that the extreme number of accommodations is causing a significant imbalance in the student body.
Thirteen percent of students enrolled with the Student Disability Service, according to the Chicago Maroon.
Collar remarked, “I feel bad for the students who aren’t taking advantage of this.” “Our student body moves at two different speeds.”
A lot of people with real disabilities said they felt bad about using the allowances they were given.
“Should I feel bad about my extended time?” asked an anonymous high school kid with Asperger’s disorder on Reddit. “I am not trying to game the system though,” he wrote. I genuinely believe that I require more time. However, a part of me believes that the length of time is the only reason for my great results.
According to Brown, almost 18% of students get accommodations of some kind. “Am I justified in getting the extended time?” Brown said. I don’t know myself at this stage.
Students are being asked the same questions by professors on social media.
One instructor stated that accommodations were “turning increasingly into academic advantages” on a Reddit page for anonymous educators.
They wrote, “It’s gotten ridiculous.”One of my students was permitted to use a “word bank” for any in-class exam this semester. A 4×6 card with a handwritten front and back was given to another.
Another reported that at least one-third of the students in their advanced classes had received accommodations.
“I am perplexed as to why this is so common, but it’s definitely not a big deal for me to accommodate this,” they remarked.
“Especially since I never had more than one or two students in a class who needed any kind of accommodation at my previous institution.”
Katy Washington, the CEO of the Association of Higher Education and Disability, told Fortune that the rise in accommodations for people with disabilities was actually a good thing.
According to her, “students with invisible disabilities were denied support for decades because their struggles were dismissed as laziness or lack of effort.”
“The increase in accommodations is not a sign of a decline in academic integrity, but rather a cultural shift toward acknowledging mental health.”
