As self-appointed defender of standardized tests, let me point out that making it difficult to get accommodations may be part of an unstated policy to reduce fraud, which is a problem for a high-stakes test. Disability advocates forced the College Board to stop flagging tests given under special circumstances. People were worried in 2002 that this change encourages the unscrupulous, as the article below discusses.
I know this does not apply to HK and hope she is able to iron out the problems.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/15/us/abuse-feared-as-sat-test-changes-disability-policy.htmlAbuse Feared as SAT Test Changes Disability Policy
By TAMAR LEWIN
New York Times
Published: July 15, 2002
The College Board has agreed to stop flagging the scores of disabled students who take the SAT under special conditions, such as extra time, in a legal settlement that could send tremors through the college admissions process.
About 2 percent of the two million high school students who take SAT's each year get some accommodations -- almost always including extra time -- because of their documented disabilities. To make sure college admission boards know this, the College Board marks these tests with a notation that says, ''Scores Obtained Under Special Conditions.''
But after September 2003, the College Board will no longer flag the disabled students' scores, a practice that advocates for the disabled have long denounced as stigmatizing and discriminatory. Without the notations, colleges will now have no way of knowing if an applicant took the test under normal conditions, or used a computer, worked in a separate quiet room, and had four and a half hours for the three-hour test.
High school guidance counselors said the elimination of flagging could set off a wave of new applications for accommodations, including some from students without real disabilities.
Although the settlement arose from litigation by a man with a physical disability, most of those who are accommodated have attention deficit problems or learning disabilities like dyslexia, a reading disorder.
''It's the right thing to do, but it's going to have very negative ramifications,'' said Brad MacGowan, a guidance counselor at Newton North High School, in an affluent suburb of Boston. ''In a perfect world, if students really need extended time to do as well as they can on a test, they should not have it flagged. But it's that flag, that asterisk, that helps cut down on abuse. This will open the floodgates to families that think they can beat the system by buying a diagnosis, and getting their kid extra time.''
