ADA Accommodations for NY Bar/MPRE Forum

[sowhatsowhatsowhat]

Hi-

Does anyone have any experience requesting accommodations for time and a half for NY bar/MPRE for ADHD? I'm concerned that I may need to be re-tested/have more documentation pre-undergrad? Is it bad that I did not get accommodations for the LSAT? I don't want to submit what I have and be denied... I would rather go through the full battery of tests and "update" my diagnosis now if this is necessary. I don't think I can take the bar exam without accommodations, as I really struggle under time constraints and have a horrible time with following instructions.

Here is what I have:

I was professionally diagnosed when I was a senior in high school (had HORRIBLE grades throughout high school and was told I had ADHD from my youth but I got good grades despite not paying attention to anything until late middle school/HS.) I did not receive accommodations for the SAT and despite leaving a decent amount blank, got about a 1250/1600 or something. I went through the hours-long battery of testing through disability services my freshman year of undergrad. I received time and a half throughout UG for exams/quiet room. I took the GRE twice and received accommodations for those exams (got high scores on both). I took the LSAT three times and did not request accommodations because of fear of stigma in the application process. It was extremely hard for me to meet the time constraints and I did not finish the exam any of the times I took it w/o accommodations, leaving me with a 157, 167, and a canceled score.

I did get accommodations at the law school, but only after having some crap grades in first and second semester. My grades went up markedly since getting the extra time (went from erratic grades because of differences in timing averaging a 3.2, then to a 3.9 and booked a class). I also have an updated diagnosis by a psychiatrist I was seeing at school, but he did not conduct the full battery of tests I had in undergrad.

Thanks.

[Assumpsit]

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[barretaker123]

I honestly hope they deny you. After that, I hope they put your attempt in a file where the graders of your bar exam can see how you tried to manipulate the system. I really hope it is extraordinarily hard to permit these accomodations. I can't think of a less serious 'illness' than ADD. So if they accomodate you, they would accomodate anyone. Then everyone taking the exam would be the real ones who were 'disabled' by people trying to cheat the system like you. Get real dude, we all have ADD...I was diagnosed at 10. All you have to do is tell your psychiatrist that you can't focus at work or school and they diagnose you and drown you in adderall or ritalin. But idk what else I would expect from a purely allopathic-medicine nation. And you didn't even get accomodations for your other standardized tests?? It is outrageous that you would think your ADD enables you to get a bonus at the expense of the other thousands of people studying 12hours a day for 3months. This is why America is going in the shitter. Everyone wants an easy A. Smh

[A. Nony Mouse]

I honestly hope they deny you. After that, I hope they put your attempt in a file where the graders of your bar exam can see how you tried to manipulate the system. I really hope it is extraordinarily hard to permit these accomodations. I can't think of a less serious 'illness' than ADD. So if they accomodate you, they would accomodate anyone. Then everyone taking the exam would be the real ones who were 'disabled' by people trying to cheat the system like you. Get real dude, we all have ADD...I was diagnosed at 10. All you have to do is tell your psychiatrist that you can't focus at work or school and they diagnose you and drown you in adderall or ritalin. But idk what else I would expect from a purely allopathic-medicine nation. And you didn't even get accomodations for your other standardized tests?? It is outrageous that you would think your ADD enables you to get a bonus at the expense of the other thousands of people studying 12hours a day for 3months. This is why America is going in the shitter. Everyone wants an easy A. Smh

This is not cool. ADHD is real and even if it's over diagnosed, you don't know anything about the OP. Get off your high horse. Besides, the bar is pass/fail - what is it to you if someone gets accommodations? It won't affect you at all.

[barretaker123]

I honestly hope they deny you. After that, I hope they put your attempt in a file where the graders of your bar exam can see how you tried to manipulate the system. I really hope it is extraordinarily hard to permit these accomodations. I can't think of a less serious 'illness' than ADD. So if they accomodate you, they would accomodate anyone. Then everyone taking the exam would be the real ones who were 'disabled' by people trying to cheat the system like you. Get real dude, we all have ADD...I was diagnosed at 10. All you have to do is tell your psychiatrist that you can't focus at work or school and they diagnose you and drown you in adderall or ritalin. But idk what else I would expect from a purely allopathic-medicine nation. And you didn't even get accomodations for your other standardized tests?? It is outrageous that you would think your ADD enables you to get a bonus at the expense of the other thousands of people studying 12hours a day for 3months. This is why America is going in the shitter. Everyone wants an easy A. Smh

This is not cool. ADHD is real and even if it's over diagnosed, you don't know anything about the OP. Get off your high horse. Besides, the bar is pass/fail - what is it to you if someone gets accommodations? It won't affect you at all.

I am not saying ADHD is fake. I am diagnosed and prescribed meds. But I would never apply for accomodations because it would be just ridiculously unfair to my peers. If you think that indicates 'high horse' arrogance, you must not be in a competitive setting of law students/lawyers often....it gets much worse. More so, I literally just posted a topic about failing the bar and providing suggestions to others. You can tell from this guy's writing that he's trying to find suggestions to find an easy route. He didn't get accomodation for the LSAT and got a 167....and the reason was because he was afraid of the stigma. Outrageous.

Further, this is a forum to express what you think. If I feel inclined to comment on something that I think is obviously manipulative, I'm not gonna hold back. I see this on a daily basis with people in law school. ===CLAIM ADHD AND ALL YOUR MOST DIFFICULT TROUBLES WILL FADE AWAY=== Sorry, I am going to support my hardworking brethren instead.

[A. Nony Mouse]

I'm an employed lawyer, so I'm around them plenty. I just don't think you get the point of accommodations and, in fact, the ADA. How are accommodations for disability unfair? They're the whole point of the ADA. And again, how does this person getting accommodations on the bar affect you? Whether they pass the bar doesn't have anything to do with your score.

I also don't think the OP looked at all manipulative. I know it happens and ADHD diagnoses can be bogus, I just don't think the OP comes across that way.

[sowhatsowhatsowhat]

I honestly hope they deny you. After that, I hope they put your attempt in a file where the graders of your bar exam can see how you tried to manipulate the system. I really hope it is extraordinarily hard to permit these accomodations. I can't think of a less serious 'illness' than ADD. So if they accomodate you, they would accomodate anyone. Then everyone taking the exam would be the real ones who were 'disabled' by people trying to cheat the system like you. Get real dude, we all have ADD...I was diagnosed at 10. All you have to do is tell your psychiatrist that you can't focus at work or school and they diagnose you and drown you in adderall or ritalin. But idk what else I would expect from a purely allopathic-medicine nation. And you didn't even get accomodations for your other standardized tests?? It is outrageous that you would think your ADD enables you to get a bonus at the expense of the other thousands of people studying 12hours a day for 3months. This is why America is going in the shitter. Everyone wants an easy A. Smh

This is not cool. ADHD is real and even if it's over diagnosed, you don't know anything about the OP. Get off your high horse. Besides, the bar is pass/fail - what is it to you if someone gets accommodations? It won't affect you at all.

I am not saying ADHD is fake. I am diagnosed and prescribed meds. But I would never apply for accomodations because it would be just ridiculously unfair to my peers. If you think that indicates 'high horse' arrogance, you must not be in a competitive setting of law students/lawyers often....it gets much worse. More so, I literally just posted a topic about failing the bar and providing suggestions to others. You can tell from this guy's writing that he's trying to find suggestions to find an easy route. He didn't get accomodation for the LSAT and got a 167....and the reason was because he was afraid of the stigma. Outrageous.

Further, this is a forum to express what you think. If I feel inclined to comment on something that I think is obviously manipulative, I'm not gonna hold back. I see this on a daily basis with people in law school. ===CLAIM ADHD AND ALL YOUR MOST DIFFICULT TROUBLES WILL FADE AWAY=== Sorry, I am going to support my hardworking brethren instead.

What you choose to do is your own situation. This is my choice. I would prefer not to take the risk that I will fail the bar. Everyone's situation is unique. Just because my low is a 157/167 or whatever, doesn't mean I should be admonished when I struggle every single day. I hate that people try to game the system, because it gives people with legit issues a bad rap. This is an open forum so everyone is entitled to their own opinions but this sort of ignorance does nothing but breed blind resentment towards people who get accommodations, and is the reason why people like me have to jump through hoops or forgo getting help when we need it. I knew people would be rude on here, but some of you ought to be ashamed of yourselves.

[barretaker123]

Lol so ridiculous. Ashamed of myself? I probably have worse ADD than you considering I was diagnosed and medicated at 10 years old and you were 18......but that's only relevant in terms of defending myself for why I am entitled to disparage a disease like ADD. I literally spit up my water when you said "struggle everyday." You struggle with not focusing???? Oh boo hoooooo.....what about the Iraqi vet who just had his right arm blown off and has to learn how to type his essays with 1 hand or write with his left only? Or what about the pregnant woman who is so overwhelmed with hormone changes she can't even think? Accommodations should be reserved for people who actually NEED a boost. This is hard for me to even type without going into a rage spin. So I am going to stop now.

P.S. My best friend tried to get accommodations for dyslexia and was denied. He didn't get it because he had not requested it for the LSAT.

[A. Nony Mouse]

It's not an oppression Olympics, for crying out loud.

[gaagoots]

A. Nony, as an employed lawyer you should know in real firm life, time restraints on filings happen all the time.

The filing window closed yesterday at 4:00 pm the runner was on standby and I had 3 hours to put together a RFO, P&A's, 3 declarations and 16 pages of the god awful JC forms CA seem to love. I have a legit gimp wrist, with a 12 in surgical scar on my arm. It's major pain when it's crunch time for typing but that 4:00 pm window monkey wasn't going to sit an extra 90 minutes to allow me to have extra time due to my disability to get it over there. I figure if I can do that in real life, then for the PT I can do it. I just have to suck up the pain.

Without hating on the OP or others with a need for accommodations, how do you approach a firm? Do you hide that learning disability at the risk of blowing a SOL? Or any other deadline? Would I hire someone who breezed through a racehorse evidence final because of that 90 extra minutes when I had to take the crappy B- because I ran of of time? That resentment runs deep in this profession.

[A. Nony Mouse]

Sure, in real life there may not be accommodations available to allow you to perform as required by a particular job. I'm not saying everyone who has some kind of disability is entitled to work at whatever job they want regardless of the nature of the disability. However, there are lots of ways to be a lawyer that don't all match the conditions of, say, the bar exam. And there are lots of ways to deal with things like ADHD in your work life if you're not required to sit in a convention center for 8 hours with hundreds of people all lined up around you and no access to any other resources. Heck, I had a student once who asked me if I minded if she played with play-doh during class (note: just kneading it in her hands, not actually modeling stuff), because she had ADHD and it helped her concentrate. I didn't care, it didn't affect anyone else, but under regular conditions you can't bring play-doh into the bar exam. I just don't think accommodations for the bar exam are a very good indication of someone's ability (or lack thereof) to work a legal job, given the artificial conditions of the bar exam and variety of possible work conditions out there.

Also, someone who needs and is getting appropriate accommodations isn't going to "breeze through" the racehorse exam compared to someone who ran out of the time unaccommodated, because the whole point is that the person with accommodations is starting well behind the starting line, or behind the unaccommodated person. If the person with accommodations needs more time to complete what the other person can complete in (say) 3 hours, they're not getting an advantage by getting extra time - they're getting the amount of time required to complete the same amount of material. If you run out in 3 hours, they'll run out in 4 - but it will be a comparable running-out-of-time.

I'm not saying no one has ever gotten an unfair advantage by getting accommodations that they don't need or that don't accurately address the conditions of the exam (or whatever's being accommodated). But that's an entirely different issue from whether accommodations, done properly, are appropriate. (And also completely different from what OP was actually asking.)

[Miznitic]

Are you going to bill your clients for more hours, because you need more time due to your disability?

[A. Nony Mouse]

Are you going to bill your clients for more hours, because you need more time due to your disability?

See my post above pointing out that there are lots of ways to manage ADHD in real life when you're not limited to bar exam conditions, and that there are lots of different ways to be a lawyer (shockingly, some don't even involve billing clients!). Requiring accommodations on something like the bar exam doesn't actually prove you will be a slow/bad lawyer.

[mornincounselor]

Post removed.

[A. Nony Mouse]

Are you going to bill your clients for more hours, because you need more time due to your disability?

See my post above pointing out that there are lots of ways to manage ADHD in real life when you're not limited to bar exam conditions, and that there are lots of different ways to be a lawyer (shockingly, some don't even involve billing clients!). Requiring accommodations on something like the bar exam doesn't actually prove you will be a slow/bad lawyer.

Well sure it doesn't prove one will be a slow/bad lawyer. The LSAT doesn't prove one will do well in law school. But, there' a mighty well defined correlation.

No, not necessarily. Taking the bar really isn't at all like practicing law. There are lots and lots of skills that go into being a good lawyer that have nothing to do with anything tested on the bar. Besides, if needing accommodations on the bar suggests someone is going to be a crappy lawyer, why not let the market take care of that? If the person is so markedly inferior, then no one would want to hire them, or if try did get hired, they wouldn't be able to keep the job, right? So why would accommodations on the bar exam matter? It's not going to give anyone an unfair advantage with regard to other bar takers - the accommodated person scoring better doesn't have any impact on anyone else's score.

[sowhatsowhatsowhat]

Lol so ridiculous. Ashamed of myself? I probably have worse ADD than you considering I was diagnosed and medicated at 10 years old and you were 18......but that's only relevant in terms of defending myself for why I am entitled to disparage a disease like ADD. I literally spit up my water when you said "struggle everyday." You struggle with not focusing???? Oh boo hoooooo.....what about the Iraqi vet who just had his right arm blown off and has to learn how to type his essays with 1 hand or write with his left only? Or what about the pregnant woman who is so overwhelmed with hormone changes she can't even think? Accommodations should be reserved for people who actually NEED a boost. This is hard for me to even type without going into a rage spin. So I am going to stop now.

P.S. My best friend tried to get accommodations for dyslexia and was denied. He didn't get it because he had not requested it for the LSAT.

I'm not sure if your posts warrant any sort of response, so I hesitate to even reply. I asked my dean about this and he said he didn't know of anyone who was denied accommodations for that reason alone. Did your "friend" receive accommodations in law school? In UG? While taking other standardized tests?

[sowhatsowhatsowhat]

This site is honestly terrifying. It's like a car crash, and I can't stop looking away. Do people really make such hasty generalizations and have such gaps in logic at your law schools? Is this normal for you? It's really scary and I'm going to climb back inside of my bubble now. There's only one person on here speaking any sort of sense. If I hadn't had a beer I wouldn't have to go on this rant, but oh well, you guys get to hear it. I'm so tired of this profession's enabling of antisocial, ignorant behavior.

Everyone should just do what they need to do. There is a point of diminishing returns re: extra time and accommodations crap, and at that point, people are not offered accommodations... I.e. I do not receive accommodations for take home exams of 8 hours or more because at that point the playing field is even. So no, I won't need to be "accommodated" throughout my time at my firm and what not. I know there are deadlines, but I have ways for overcompensating for those (i.e. working my a$$ off, as I did at my firm this summer.) I did not feel like I worked a great deal more than anyone else. I just need to be accommodated in a situation where there is a forced, unnatural time crunch in order to generate any sort of differences in grades to create a curve. The "time crunch" that is real in a litigation scenario does not involve regurgitating a bunch of crap from memory or typing at a ridiculous pace.

Also, the whole "people have worse disabilities than you" thing is not a valid argument. Pretty sure all of the case law that condones that sort of crappy reasoning was overturned with the most recent amendments to the ADA in the 2000s. Nice try, though.

Thanks for helping me procrastinate my fed courts reading, tho.

PS. I'm not a dude. Thanks for assuming. Again, with those great logical leaps.

[Assumpsit]

I agree with barrettaker.

And to "I just need to be accommodated in a situation where there is a forced, unnatural time crunch in order to generate any sort of differences in grades to create a curve."

Give me a fucking break. Just the absurdity of this statement and all the shit that must go on in your brain when you type something like that out, multiplied by the fact that law school is a giant competition against one another, and you can write shit like that with a straight face.

[OklahomasOK]

I agree with barrettaker.

And to "I just need to be accommodated in a situation where there is a forced, unnatural time crunch in order to generate any sort of differences in grades to create a curve."

Give me a fucking break. Just the absurdity of this statement and all the shit that must go on in your brain when you type something like that out, multiplied by the fact that law school is a giant competition against one another, and you can write shit like that with a straight face.

Yep. Shit won't fly in practice, shouldn't fly on the bar.

[kenji]

I agree with barrettaker.

And to "I just need to be accommodated in a situation where there is a forced, unnatural time crunch in order to generate any sort of differences in grades to create a curve."

Give me a fucking break. Just the absurdity of this statement and all the shit that must go on in your brain when you type something like that out, multiplied by the fact that law school is a giant competition against one another, and you can write shit like that with a straight face.

Good job proving his point about being ignorant and antisocial.

[BullShitWithBravado]

Barretaker123 should stop taking ADD meds. I think they give him an unfair advantage.