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[Old Skool]

Here's why its a problem:

1. It means that rich middle class kids get an extra hour for a 3 hr exam because their pushy parents can't cope with junior flunking.

2. It means that rich middle class kids get a carte blanche meal ticket for ANY failings in their academic career.

3. The sort of ridiculous accomodations made are setting them up for abject failure the second they leave university. Really, who is going to employ ANYONE who needs an extra twenty minutes for every hour they work? Or who need everything in 16 sized font. Or on pink paper. Or can only work in a room on their own.

I had a student last year who came in to say that at high school she was used to A grades but at university she had not done as well as she expected so over the summer she went to some quack, sorry "doctor", who "diagnosed" that she must be "dyslexic".

She now has the documentation and the legal "right" for all sorts of special pleadings and breaks that the rest of the student body don't get.

QUESTION: how many working class or minority kids have this "dyslexia" thing?

QUESTION: how come it didn't exist until 10 years ago?

[Tenured Feminist]

I don't think I will reveal my age, but I am more than 15.  I am dyslexic and have known this since fourth grade.  In the spirit of self-revelation, I will also tell you that, while I am not a racial minority, I did grow up in a working class milieu.  Parents divorced, mom a secretary, dad a machinist.

It is a real disorder that has real impacts in the lives of those who struggle with it.  And it is possible to have a successful career despite having it.

Go do some actual reading before running your mouth ignorantly.  And don't conflate actual diagnosed disabilities with a culture of unreasonable accommodation.

[Realist]

Ah, the "tenured feminist" who was boasting earlier how mommy forced your school to pass your fourth grade when you flunked (it was called being thick a while ago - now its "learning difficulties". LOL).

Great role model.

[Tenured Feminist]

Uh, I'd suggest that an undergraduate degree from a top university, an additional professional degree, and an earned Ph.D. from a top ten program constitute a fairly strong refutation.  Unless you are arguing that all instructional evaluators are infallible?  But wouldn't that tend to undercut your moniker?

[Untenured]

TF,

It's not worth it.  Stay out of the dog poop.  Don't waste your emotional energy.  The OP sheds lots of heat and little light.  Maybe this is our friendly anti-AA guy or just a disgruntled deadwood screeching for attention.  In any event, it's the fast lane to trollsville.  I wouldn't bother unless someone raises points of substance.

Untenured

[%sig%]

[dyslexic]

I am also a dyslexic academic, and it is a real disorder.  I am one of the luckier members of my family, since my dyslexia is something I can hide from others without too many major adjustments (nothing I tell anyone about).  Some of my family members have problems that are severe enough that taking a single college class would be a major achievement beyond their wildest dreams.  Some are in the middle range, where a few minor adjustments make college possible.  

Some accomadations are unreasonable (this I agree with), but some situations in college are completely without equal in the real world.  When you write a paper in the real world, you are rarely just given a specific hour to write it.  If you have a report for work, you can spend extra time on that report outside work time.  If your institution has a problem with proper accomadations (giving time when it's not needed, giving more than is really needed, etc.), then take it up with your disability services office.  They may listen if you approach without being so judgemental.

[Tenured Feminist]

Thanks so much for your very kind words.  I've graded 40 very bad papers in the last 48 hours and I'm literally ready to drop dead with despair.  Would that I could explain it all away as undiagnosed disabilities and pass out As like Halloween candy!  :)

[.]

No, blame it on you have "learning difficulties" and then reel off your "impressive" credentials.........without actually bothering to engage in the issues other than screeching that "dyslexia" exists. Screech long enough and people will believe you, right? Way to go.

[Anon]

There is  very real debate about whether or not dyslexia exists to the levels that people are now claiming today.

It is disturbing that these issues are waved away by "tenured feminist" with the stock answer that "it exists, deal with it".

I wonder whether in ten years time dyslexia will actually still be diagnosed at its current levels.

It has certainly got out of hand at my college.

[Tenured Feminist]

OK, I will ramp down the rhetoric a bit.  I see a good deal of conflation taking place in this discussion.  There are many disabilities out there for which students request accommodations of various types.  What concerns me is that people are making the following types of claims:

1) I have students who request outrageous accommodation on the basis of some undiagnosed (or illegitimately diagnosed) disability, and I suspect that they're lazy or just looking for an extra bite at the apple or other advantage; or

2) If they actually have the claimed disability, they should figure out how to deal with it without any accommodation, since they won't be accommodated in the real world; or

3) The whole "industry" of disability identification is a crude mask for pushy parents to pamper their privileged offspring; or

4) All these disabilities sound the same to me -- dyslexia, ADD, ADHD, Asberger's Syndrome, etc.  I can't tell the difference or even understand what the claim is, and since the disability is not visible or diagnosable through something like a blood test, I think it's ripe for manipulation and abuse.  Therefore

5) Anyone who claims that s/he has one of these non-visible disabilities should be mistrusted and suspected; and

6) The default response to a request for accommodation should be no if I don't think it's going to get me in trouble with some administrator.

To situate myself and my contributions to this debate, please remember that the ORIGINAL question was whether dyslexia exists.  As far as I know, there is not a current PR study purporting to demonstrate that it does not.  Dyslexia is a specific disorder with a specific etiology that is not the same as other disorders with which I am somewhat less familiar.  Nonetheless, I am convinced by the weight of scientific literature that these disorders do exist and are related to brain functioning.  So I do think that we need to accept that these disorders are real.  The challenge, then, is figuring out what to do about them.  And that, it would seem, is a much more productive discussion to have.

And the reason I have told my own story is that I think it shows one example of a person with a mild form of one of these disorders who has managed to have a successful career without much accommodation along the way.  And whatever you may think of me, my posts, my mother, or my fourth grade teacher, if one takes the basic standard for success in my chosen profession -- the achievement of tenure -- I have earned it.  And no, I did not request an extra year added on to my tenure clock so I could proofread my articles.

I will start a new thread in the hope of generating a more interesting conversation.

[mouse]

I have a serious question:

Diagnoses of dyslexia are becoming more common.  There are obviously some on this board who believe that this is the result of spurious diagnoses.  Other possible explanations, however, would be that testing for dyslexia is becoming more widespread and improved, or that the incidence of dyslexia is indeed increasing (like, for instance, the incidence of asthsma).

Have any studies of this been published?

[trabb]

*Disclaimer*: trabb has not read all of the other threads on this topic because they got silly.  Someone else may have already said what I have to say.

Let us assume for the sake of preserving collegiality that Old Skool is not an old skool troll.

Old Skool wrote:

> Here's why its a problem:
>
> 1. It means that rich middle class kids get an extra hour for a
> 3 hr exam because their pushy parents can't cope with junior
> flunking.
>

Quite a bit of research has shown that when students with learning disabilities are given additional time, their scores on exams will be the same as their peers.  When required to finish the exam in the same amount of time as their peers, their scores are significantly lower.

My anecdotal evidence shows that rich middle class kids who would flunk my three hour exam would also flunk my exam if they were given four hours or six hours or twenty hours.  If they do not know the material, they will not pass if they sit and write for a week.

[%sig%]

[see dick slack]

Dyslexia went way up after "whole language" replaced phonics.  If you don't teach kids phonically, they will be less likely to become fluent readers, period, and if anyone who is not obviously severely retarded but who has reading difficulties is labeled dyslexic, then lack of phonics causes dyslexia.

[GroovyOldDude]

I think Old Skool has confused dyslexia with ADD/ADHD, a supposed condition which is truly a bunch of hooey.

[tenured chauvinst]

Old Skool wrote:

> Here's why its a problem:
>
> 1. It means that rich middle class kids get an extra hour for a
> 3 hr exam because their pushy parents can't cope with junior
> flunking.
>
> 2. It means that rich middle class kids get a carte blanche
> meal ticket for ANY failings in their academic career.
>

This has nothing whatsoever to do with being rich.

In my classes the overwhelming number of disability certified students are racial minorities.  (and no, I don't teach at a HBCU)

I have no idea of whether or not they are rich.

by the way, how do YOU know whether or not your students are working class? Did you ask?

If you didn't ask, then you're guessing.  shame, shame...