by dathinab | 2025-12-04 22:17:46+00:00
there is so much wrong with the first few paragraphs of this article

1. some of the things they list as "disabilities" are sicknesses which _can_ be disabling but not per see disabilities

2. all of the things listed aren't one/off but have not just huge gradients, but huge variations. You might be afflicted in a way which "disables" you from living a normal live or job but still might be able to handle university due to how it differs.

3. non of the things list is per-see/directly reducing your ability to have deep understanding in a specialized field. ADHD sometimes comes with hyper focus, which if it manifest in the right way can help you in university. It's also might make more "traditionally structured jobs" hardly possible for you and bad luck with how professors handle their courses is more likely to screw you over. Anxiety is often enough more topic specific, e.g. social anxiety. This means it can be disabling for many normal jobs but not affect you in universities which don't require you physical presence, but if they do you basically wait out the course and then learn after being back home. In rare cases it can also help with crunch learning before an exam. Etc. etc.

Actually if we go a step future all of the named health issues can make it more likely for you to end up in high standard universities. Hyper focus on specific topics from ADHD might have started your journey into science even as a child. Anxiety might have lead to you studying more. Since might have been an escape from a painful reality which later lead to you developing depression.

If we consider how high standard universities can cause a lot of stress which can cause an out brake of anxiety or depression in some people it just is another data point why we would expect higher number of health issues (if you lump a bunch of very different issues together like they do).

Later they then also throw in autism in the list of mental issues, even through autism always had been higher represented in academia due to how it sometimes comes with "special interests" and make socializing as a child harder, i.e. it can lead to a child very early and very long term focusing on scientific topics out of their fully own interest. (But it doesn't have to, it can also thoroughly destroy you live to a point "learning to cope with it" isn't possible anymore and you are basically crippled as long as you don't luck out massively with your job and environment.)

Honestly the whole article has a undertone of people with "autism, ADHD, anxiety, depression" shouldn't be "elite" university and any accommodations for them should be cut.

Now to be fair accommodations have to be reasonable and you have to learn to cope with your issues. Idk. how they are handled in the US, but from what I have seen in the EU that is normally the case. E.g. with dyslexia and subtle nerve damage making hand writing harder I could have gotten a slight time extensions for any non-multiple choice exams. I didn't bother because it didn't matter all (but one) exams where done in a way where if you know the topic well you can finish in 60-70% of the time and if you don't even 3x time would not help you much (and the extension was like flat 15min). That is except if my nerve damage or dyslexia where worse then I really would have needed the time, not for solving questions but for writing down answers. There was one exam which tested more if you had crammed in all knowledge then testing understanding, in that exam due to dyslexia and my hands not being able to write quite as fast as normal I actually last some points, not because I didn't know but because I wasn't able to write fast enough.

The point here is if done well people which don't need accommodations shouldn't have a huge benefits even if they get them, but people needing it not getting it can mean punishing them for thing unrelated to actual skills. Live will do so enough after university, no need to force it into universities which should focus on excellence of knowledge and understanding.