Dyslexic/Learning Disabled Students At Dartmouth College N a n ~ W. Pompian Carl P. Thum
Dartmouth College Hanover, New Hampshire
Dartmouth College, a highly selective Ivy League college with 4100 undergraduates, has a small but significant number of dyslexic~learning-disabled students, two-thirds of whom were identified through diagnostic testing at Dartmouth. Close advising relationships and intensive interviews with Dartmouth learning-disabled students reveal a profile of a particular category of learning-disabled college students. In spite of experiencing difficulty in a specific content area or with an informationprocessing task, learning-disabled Dartmouth students achieve well academically, socially, and extracurricularly, get high scores on timed SAT and IQ tests, and rely when necessary on accommodations, rather than remedial courses or specialized tutorial assistance. The authors surveyed selective colleges in 1986 and 1988 and found an increase in awareness and academic accommodations at other selective colleges during this two-year period. A 1987 dyslexic/learning-disabilities symposium hosted by Dartmouth is described, as are Dartmouth's services and accommodations. The authors provide a suggested list of services and resources for highly selective colleges.
Dartmouth College, a highly selective Ivy League college with 4100 undergraduates, has a small but significant number of dyslexic/learningdisabled students*, the majority of w h o m were identified while attending Dartmouth. This information surprises many people who assume Ivy League institutions do not admit dyslexic and other learning-disabled students. It is our belief that there are learning-disabled students at every highly selective American college, but a twenty-college survey conducted *Sincenot all learning-disabledstudents are dyslexic,we will refer to this population as "learningdisabled." Annals of Dyslexia, Vol. 38, 1988.
Copyright ©1988by The Orton DyslexiaSociety ISSN0474-7534 276
DYSLEXIC STUDENTS AT DARTMOUTH
277
by Dartmouth's Academic Skills Center in 1986 revealed that few of these colleges were aware of learning-disabled students at their institutions. Some categorically stated that they had no enrolled learning-disabled students (Heiserman et al. 1986). The survey was repeated in 1988 with the same twenty colleges plus twenty-one more selective institutions (Chaplin, Thum, and Pompian 1988). The authors determined that there was increased awareness during the two years. In particular, three survey questions appeared to indicate a college's sensitivity to learning disabilities: Does it have a written college policy? Does it provide learning disabilities testing? Does it grant a waiver if it has a foreign language requirement? The results are shown in Table I. Though the 1988 survey does indicate increased awareness in important areas, several other responses to questions in the 1988 survey of 41 institutions suggest a continuing low level of awareness of learning disabilities at selective American colleges and universities. Two examples: • The majority of the colleges knew of only a small number of learningdisabled students on their campuses. Only three colleges reported 75 or more; two colleges reported between 51 and 75; four colleges knew of between 26 and 50; while 25 reported only between 0 and 25 learning-disabled students. • The number of students identified (diagnosed) as learning disabled while attending that institution was correspondingly low. One college reported having identified 50 to 75; three colleges identified 25 to 50, while 26 identified only 0 to 25.
Table I Partial Results, 1986 and 1988 Questionnaires, Selective Colleges Response Rate Year # of institutions # of respondents % of response 1986 20 17 85.0 1988 41 35 85.4 Provisions Year 1986 1988
Year 1986 1988
# w/written policy % 2 11.8 13 37.1 Foreign Language # w/lang. requir. 12 23
% 70.6 65.7
# providing 1.d. testing 5 16
% 29.4 45.7
# w/lang. waiver 11 19
% 64.7 82.6
278
THE INTERDEPENDENCE OF THEORY AND PRACTICE
Profile
A general profile of a learning-disabled Dartmouth student can be drawn from four years (since 1984) of close working, often advocating, relationships and in-depth interviews with over 50 students. Each of these students has been diagnosed as dyslexic, dysgraphic, dysnomic, dyscalculaic, or having some kind of visual-spatial disorder. What do these successful learning-disabled students have in common? High intelligence. After Dartmouth hired a part-time diagnostician in 1987, the Academic Skills Center had access to diagnostic evaluations and was able to keep statistics on students tested at Dartmouth as learning disabled, a total of 22 at the time of this report. The average full-scale IQ score for 22 students who tested "positive" in 1987 was 122 in a fullscale range from 99 to 141. Mean verbal IQ for this group was 123.8 in a range from 102 to 146. Mean performance IQ was 113.8 in a range from 85 to 134. High timed SAT scores. The SAT scores of 55 students diagnosed at Dartmouth over a period of four years averaged 630 mathematics (in a range from 450 to 750) and 580 verbal (in a range from 410 to 780). Though these mean scores are each 50 points lower than the Dartmouth College mean, they are high compared to the national norm and include some very high (700 +) individual SAT scores. Fewer than five of the 55 students interviewed had taken the SAT's untimed. Excellent high school achievement. The most likely reason that twothirds of Dartmouth's learning-disabled students were identified and diagnosed at Dartmouth is that there was no reason to suspect their being learning disabled before college. They were admitted to Dartmouth by the same criteria as other, non-learning-disabled students. They received excellent grades in all their high school courses, including those that would present difficulty for them at Dartmouth. The best example is foreign language learning. Because of their high intelligence and because many high schools use a traditional, textbook style of teaching a foreign language, students were able to memorize the information without understanding it. The demanding, fast-paced audiolingual method of Dartmouth's foreign language teaching, however, forced their disabilities to surface. Self-awareness about their own learning styles. Contrasted with other, non-learning-disabled Dartmouth students who earn high grades but have little insight into their learning processes, students in this special population are very much aware of how they learn best, whether it is visually, auditorially, or otherwise. They exploit their preferred learning styles in their study habits. They do not need to be taught how to s t u d y - they already know how. They have learned how to be good time managers. They start papers early, schedule their time, and use a private, quiet place to study. They discuss the course material with peers and professors. They ask questions. They are good notetakers. They read chapter
DYSLEXIC STUDENTS AT DARTMOUTH
279
summaries and subtitles. They read slowly, and so they start their reading early. One dyslexic student at the Dartmouth Medical School confesses that summaries and subtitles are about all she reads other than her own class or lecture notes. Supportive Family and Educational Backgrounds. As Harvard psychologist Kenneth Dinklage has noted (1971), successful learning-disabled Harvard students often come from supportive families. Some families gave their dyslexic children a separate education outside of school--constant exposure to museums, concerts, extracurricular lessons and travel, private tutors, and time together working on creative projects at home. The few students who were diagnosed early in elementary school received special tutoring while at the same time being part of the "gifted" program. Well-developed social and communication skills. The social skills of many Dartmouth dyslexics are finely honed. They have learned or developed very effective personal styles and communication skills, often including charm, persuasion, and wit. Surprisingly, despite difficulty in learning a foreign language, six Dartmouth dyslexics were skilled enough in language to have been successful debaters in high school. Three were state champions, one of whom was nationally ranked. In another seeming contradiction, two or three Dartmouth dyslexics every year write regularly for the daily Dartmouth, the student newspaper. They state that the inverted pyramid style of newswriting helps them to organize their material. They report using computer spelling checkers and having to write more drafts than their fellow student writer-reporters. Successful Dartmouth Careers. Since the authors started keeping records in 1984, no known learning-disabled students have dropped out of Dartmouth. (The college retention rate is 97 percent.)
Diagnosis Two-thirds of the 45 currently enrolled learning-disabled students were diagnosed at Dartmouth. In the fall of 1987, an additional ten freshmen, not counted in the 45, identified themselves as having a learning disability in response to a question about learning disabilities on a postadmission form. More pre-Dartmouth diagnoses may be the coming trend as elementary and high schools become more active in identification and diagnosis. Interestingly, eight of the ten self-identified freshmen went to private schools. Eighty-five percent of the diagnosed students have a language-based disability. The remainder have visual-spatial disorders. Because of the fast-paced audiolingual technique that is used exclusively to teach beginning foreign language courses at Dartmouth, many of the undiagnosed students are discovered because they cannot succeed in their struggle to
280
THE INTERDEPENDENCE OF THEORY AND PRACTICE
meet the college's language requirement. The Rassias method depends on auditory (and, to a lesser extent, visual) short-term memory, the areas of disability for most students. Ratio of Males to Females
Much attention in the literature has been given to the fact that many more males have learning disabilities than females. This is not true at Dartmouth, where the 1988 ratio is 3:2 male to female. In 1986 and 1987, the ratio was 1:1.
Services and A c c o m m o d a t i o n s
Dartmouth does not offer a model college program for learningdisabled students. Many less selective colleges and universities have specific learning-disabilities programs, the elements of which are detailed in commercial college guides found in bookstores (Mangrum and Strichart 1985; Straughn and Colby 1985, for example). When learning-disabled high school students or their parents call the Academic Skills Center to inquire about Dartmouth's "program," we are quick to say that we do not have a specific program. Except for a part-time diagnostician, no one at the college is a specialist in working with learningdisabled students. We do not provide specially trained tutors, nor do we offer separate courses or workshops. The college does not provide any special funds for learning disabilities services other than testing. Though Dartmouth does not have a formal program, nor do most selective and highly selective American colleges and universities (Chaplin, Thum, and Pompian 1988), Dartmouth does comply with Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. Dartmouth does not discriminate against learning- disabled students in its admissions, access to programs and services, or academic or graduation requirements. The college provides reasonable, often generous, accommodations in learning and testing situations and even allows a waiver of the foreign language requirement. Lastly, the college has a 504 coordinator who oversees and guarantees reasonable accommodations for all students with disabilities. In place of a specific program, we have devoted much of our time and energy to accomplishing three tasks: 1) raising the awareness of learning disability issues among the faculty, administration, and students; 2) providing a sympathetic place where undiagnosed and diagnosed learningdisabled students can go; and 3) developing a smooth process whereby students suspected of being learning disabled can be referred for screening and diagnostic testing, then be made aware of what options and accommodations are available to them in a timely way. The goal of all three efforts is to give learning-disabled students the support and guidance they need to succeed at Dartmouth. Dartmouth's system of referral, diagnosis, and accommodation has
DYSLEXIC STUDENTS AT DARTMOUTH
281
been hard won. Whole years have passed before we could persuade the administration to make changes in how students should properly be diagnosed and given reasonable accommodations. Often we felt beleaguered, misunderstood, and frustrated. One can well imagine how many of the faculty and administrators at one of the finest colleges in the country reacted to even the mere suggestion that some students at Dartmouth College have learning disabilities. The first reaction and response most often is, "How did they get accepted?" But persistence, time, and effort, plus the irrefutable data we collected from Dartmouth students, eventually wore down the opposition and slowly converted most of the nonbelievers. Dartmouth's program for its learning-disabled students is most accurately labeled as accommodation rather than remediation. Our experience is that learning-disabled Dartmouth students do not need or ask for much more than what we have recently developed. The college currently provides its learning-disabled students with a supportive, empathic, and advocative place on campus for them to go and know that their difficulties will be understood and where they can discuss ideas for resolving their specific learning difficulties. Most often this means advice on courses and professors, information about enrollment and bureaucratic matters, and assistance in receiving simple accommodations (more time on tests, for example) from professors. The most problematic issues for learning-disabled Dartmouth students are the pressures of time and the heavy academic workload (long reading and regular writing assignments and additional projects in each course). Also, having enough time to demonstrate knowledge and understanding on examinations is a commonly expressed concern for many of the students. Accommodations regarding more time are most commonly worked out between individual students and their professors. We do have an informal support group, much like Brown University's, composed of those students who find it helpful to get together once a month to talk about mutual concerns and share advice with others, especially freshman students. We are currently borrowing from Harvard the idea of inviting speakers to present short talks on topics related to learning disabilities and enlarging the group to include Dartmouth faculty, some of whom are dyslexic, and interested community members.
Referral, Screening, and Diagnostic Procedure Referrals depend upon awareness. We believe our greatest accomplishment has been to develop an institutional process whereby undiagnosed students, experiencing great difficulty in a particular course or discipline, are referred to the Academic Skills Center. Referrals come from faculty members, deans, and less often, the students themselves. Every year, the dean of the college sends a letter to every faculty member de-
282
THE [IVTERDEPENDENCEOF THEORY AND PK4CTICE
scribing learning disabilities and asking faculty members to refer students suspected of having a learning disability to the Academic Skills Center. The dean also sends every student a descriptive article about learning disabilities, "Like a Volvo Lifted Off My Chest," (Pompian 1986) in the Undergraduate Bulletin. A brochure called "Dyslexia/Learning Disabilities at Dartmouth" is distributed four times a year. Undergraduate advisors receive information from the Academic Skills Center about learning disabilities during their orientation. Last year, the founder of the Landmark schools gave a public lecture on the campus. This year, the faculty talked about learning disabilities in faculty meetings when they were asked to vote on formalizing the granting of language waivers. Next year we hope to take part in the training of undergraduate foreign-language drill instructors. The first step in our referral process occurs when a dean, faculty member, or student calls the Academic Skills Center with a question about a possible learning disability. We reserve an hour to screen students referred to the Academic Skills Center. The notion behind screening is to weed out those students who merely have poor study habits, are underprepared to do Dartmouth College level work, lack goals, or are malingering. Our screening is intended to elicit emotional content as well as factual material. The interview is open-ended. Interestingly, almost all of the students who are referred for screening exhibit the classic characteristics we have found so often signal a learning disability. Students are then referred for diagnostic testing at the student health center. A trained and certified diagnostician conducts a four-hour-long battery of tests and an interview which includes: an adult intelligence test and tests for auditory perception and conceptualization of speech sounds, visual retention, visual-motor integration, visual memory, a complete medical, school, and family history, and an informal writing sample. The diagnostic session is followed within two weeks by a second session, which includes the student, the diagnostician, and staff from the Academic Skills Center. The student is provided with a thorough understanding of his or her diagnosis and given recommendations as to course work and career paths. We refer about 30 students a year to the diagnostician, and 85 percent of these referrals have resulted in a diagnosis of "positive." If the student's insurance company does not reimburse for psychoeducational testing, the college pays for the testing. Students not identified as learning disabled also have a second meeting to discuss the diagnostic evaluation and study strategies. Students admitted to the college fill out a health form that includes a question about learning disabilities. If they self-identify, we send them a letter telling about our services and inviting them to visit. If they feel they require any academic accommodations such as more time on tests or an alternative form of examination, they must have their diagnoses reviewed and approved by the college's learning-disabilities specialist. We are developing a policy on how recent the tests should be. To qualify for review,
DYSLEXIC STUDENTS AT DARTMOUTH
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the battery needs to include an intelligence test, perceptual and cognitive tests, a good school history, and an analyzed writing sample. When students self-identify, they are invited to attend support group meetings.
Selective College Symposium In April of 1987, the Academic Skills Center and Dartmouth College, with support from the New England Branch of The Orton Dyslexia Society and the Foundation for Children with Learning Disabilities, hosted a 34-college symposium. The intent of the symposium was to educate other highly selective institutions of post-secondary education who did not have services for or had little awareness of learning-disabled students in their respective colleges and universities. We invited faculty and administrators from all over the United States, many of whom attended--professors, deans, provosts, and attorneys. Some of the colleges sent administrators from academic support centers, health services, disability services, and admissions offices, as well as students. Panel discussions included "Learning Disabilities and the Law," "Symptoms and Manifestations of Learning Disabilities," "Our Academic Experiences" (students from Harvard, Amherst, Cornell, and Dartmouth), "Foreign Languages," "The Admissions Process," and "Providing Support Services." Panelists included faculty members and administrators, learning disabilities specialists, lawyers from colleges, the Office of Civil Rights, and the private sector, and physicians who have specialized in learning disabilities, including Albert Galaburda, M.D., from the Neuroanatomy Laboratory at Beth Israel Hospital in Boston. Dr. Galaburda's slide-lecture was open to the public and drew a large audience. During the few years we have been involved in this issue and, as a result of the Dartmouth symposium, we believe that every college or university, especially highly selective ones that are uneducated about learning disabilities, should begin to develop at the very least the following services and resources: • A specific office clearly identified by the entire institution, staffed by a person who is knowledgeable about learning disabilities and related laws (the Office of Civil Rights of the Department of Education requires that every college receiving federal funds of any kind have a Section 504 Coordinator [Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973]). • A clearly established referral system within the college. • A process for identifying and diagnosing students. • A staff specialist in learning disabilities available for diagnosis and counseling. • College payment for diagnosis, if not covered by insurance. • Campuswide awareness through the college handbook, a specific
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THE INTERDEPENDENCE OF THEORY AND PRACTICE
brochure, periodic mailings to students and staff, including a description of the characteristics of a learning disability, and an annual mailing to faculty from the dean. • Academic support personnel trained to recognize the characteristics of a learning disability. • Reasonable accommodations, especially for all-college graduation requirements such as foreign language or math. Examples are additional time on tests and alternative forms of course-content examinations, waivers, and course substitutions. • The collection of data concerning the college's learning-disabled students, including numbers, types of learning disabilities, and case histories.
References Chaplin, K., Thum, C., and Pompian, N. 1988. A Follow-up Survey on Learning Disabilities in Highly Selective Colleges. Unpublished surve~ Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH. Dinklage, Kenneth T. 1971. Inability to Learn a Foreign Language. tn G. Blaine and C. McArthur (eds.). Emotional Problems of the StudenL Second edition. New York: Appleton-Century Crofts. Heiserman, A., Chaplin, K., Pompian, N., and Thum, C. 1986. A Survey on Learning Disabilities in Highly Selective Colleges. Unpublished survey, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH. Mangrum, C. T., and Strichart, S. S. 1985. Peterson's Guide to Colleges with Programs for Learning-Disabled Students. Princeton: Peterson's Guides. Pompian, N. 1986. Like a Volvo Lifted Off My Chest. Undergraduate Bulletin. Dartmouth College. Straughn, C. T., and Colby, M. 1985. Lovejoy's College Guide for the Learning Disabled. New York: Monarch Press.
Dartmouth College Hanover, New Hampshire
Dartmouth College, a highly selective Ivy League college with 4100 undergraduates, has a small but significant number of dyslexic~learning-disabled students, two-thirds of whom were identified through diagnostic testing at Dartmouth. Close advising relationships and intensive interviews with Dartmouth learning-disabled students reveal a profile of a particular category of learning-disabled college students. In spite of experiencing difficulty in a specific content area or with an informationprocessing task, learning-disabled Dartmouth students achieve well academically, socially, and extracurricularly, get high scores on timed SAT and IQ tests, and rely when necessary on accommodations, rather than remedial courses or specialized tutorial assistance. The authors surveyed selective colleges in 1986 and 1988 and found an increase in awareness and academic accommodations at other selective colleges during this two-year period. A 1987 dyslexic/learning-disabilities symposium hosted by Dartmouth is described, as are Dartmouth's services and accommodations. The authors provide a suggested list of services and resources for highly selective colleges.
Dartmouth College, a highly selective Ivy League college with 4100 undergraduates, has a small but significant number of dyslexic/learningdisabled students*, the majority of w h o m were identified while attending Dartmouth. This information surprises many people who assume Ivy League institutions do not admit dyslexic and other learning-disabled students. It is our belief that there are learning-disabled students at every highly selective American college, but a twenty-college survey conducted *Sincenot all learning-disabledstudents are dyslexic,we will refer to this population as "learningdisabled." Annals of Dyslexia, Vol. 38, 1988.
Copyright ©1988by The Orton DyslexiaSociety ISSN0474-7534 276
DYSLEXIC STUDENTS AT DARTMOUTH
277
by Dartmouth's Academic Skills Center in 1986 revealed that few of these colleges were aware of learning-disabled students at their institutions. Some categorically stated that they had no enrolled learning-disabled students (Heiserman et al. 1986). The survey was repeated in 1988 with the same twenty colleges plus twenty-one more selective institutions (Chaplin, Thum, and Pompian 1988). The authors determined that there was increased awareness during the two years. In particular, three survey questions appeared to indicate a college's sensitivity to learning disabilities: Does it have a written college policy? Does it provide learning disabilities testing? Does it grant a waiver if it has a foreign language requirement? The results are shown in Table I. Though the 1988 survey does indicate increased awareness in important areas, several other responses to questions in the 1988 survey of 41 institutions suggest a continuing low level of awareness of learning disabilities at selective American colleges and universities. Two examples: • The majority of the colleges knew of only a small number of learningdisabled students on their campuses. Only three colleges reported 75 or more; two colleges reported between 51 and 75; four colleges knew of between 26 and 50; while 25 reported only between 0 and 25 learning-disabled students. • The number of students identified (diagnosed) as learning disabled while attending that institution was correspondingly low. One college reported having identified 50 to 75; three colleges identified 25 to 50, while 26 identified only 0 to 25.
Table I Partial Results, 1986 and 1988 Questionnaires, Selective Colleges Response Rate Year # of institutions # of respondents % of response 1986 20 17 85.0 1988 41 35 85.4 Provisions Year 1986 1988
Year 1986 1988
# w/written policy % 2 11.8 13 37.1 Foreign Language # w/lang. requir. 12 23
% 70.6 65.7
# providing 1.d. testing 5 16
% 29.4 45.7
# w/lang. waiver 11 19
% 64.7 82.6
278
THE INTERDEPENDENCE OF THEORY AND PRACTICE
Profile
A general profile of a learning-disabled Dartmouth student can be drawn from four years (since 1984) of close working, often advocating, relationships and in-depth interviews with over 50 students. Each of these students has been diagnosed as dyslexic, dysgraphic, dysnomic, dyscalculaic, or having some kind of visual-spatial disorder. What do these successful learning-disabled students have in common? High intelligence. After Dartmouth hired a part-time diagnostician in 1987, the Academic Skills Center had access to diagnostic evaluations and was able to keep statistics on students tested at Dartmouth as learning disabled, a total of 22 at the time of this report. The average full-scale IQ score for 22 students who tested "positive" in 1987 was 122 in a fullscale range from 99 to 141. Mean verbal IQ for this group was 123.8 in a range from 102 to 146. Mean performance IQ was 113.8 in a range from 85 to 134. High timed SAT scores. The SAT scores of 55 students diagnosed at Dartmouth over a period of four years averaged 630 mathematics (in a range from 450 to 750) and 580 verbal (in a range from 410 to 780). Though these mean scores are each 50 points lower than the Dartmouth College mean, they are high compared to the national norm and include some very high (700 +) individual SAT scores. Fewer than five of the 55 students interviewed had taken the SAT's untimed. Excellent high school achievement. The most likely reason that twothirds of Dartmouth's learning-disabled students were identified and diagnosed at Dartmouth is that there was no reason to suspect their being learning disabled before college. They were admitted to Dartmouth by the same criteria as other, non-learning-disabled students. They received excellent grades in all their high school courses, including those that would present difficulty for them at Dartmouth. The best example is foreign language learning. Because of their high intelligence and because many high schools use a traditional, textbook style of teaching a foreign language, students were able to memorize the information without understanding it. The demanding, fast-paced audiolingual method of Dartmouth's foreign language teaching, however, forced their disabilities to surface. Self-awareness about their own learning styles. Contrasted with other, non-learning-disabled Dartmouth students who earn high grades but have little insight into their learning processes, students in this special population are very much aware of how they learn best, whether it is visually, auditorially, or otherwise. They exploit their preferred learning styles in their study habits. They do not need to be taught how to s t u d y - they already know how. They have learned how to be good time managers. They start papers early, schedule their time, and use a private, quiet place to study. They discuss the course material with peers and professors. They ask questions. They are good notetakers. They read chapter
DYSLEXIC STUDENTS AT DARTMOUTH
279
summaries and subtitles. They read slowly, and so they start their reading early. One dyslexic student at the Dartmouth Medical School confesses that summaries and subtitles are about all she reads other than her own class or lecture notes. Supportive Family and Educational Backgrounds. As Harvard psychologist Kenneth Dinklage has noted (1971), successful learning-disabled Harvard students often come from supportive families. Some families gave their dyslexic children a separate education outside of school--constant exposure to museums, concerts, extracurricular lessons and travel, private tutors, and time together working on creative projects at home. The few students who were diagnosed early in elementary school received special tutoring while at the same time being part of the "gifted" program. Well-developed social and communication skills. The social skills of many Dartmouth dyslexics are finely honed. They have learned or developed very effective personal styles and communication skills, often including charm, persuasion, and wit. Surprisingly, despite difficulty in learning a foreign language, six Dartmouth dyslexics were skilled enough in language to have been successful debaters in high school. Three were state champions, one of whom was nationally ranked. In another seeming contradiction, two or three Dartmouth dyslexics every year write regularly for the daily Dartmouth, the student newspaper. They state that the inverted pyramid style of newswriting helps them to organize their material. They report using computer spelling checkers and having to write more drafts than their fellow student writer-reporters. Successful Dartmouth Careers. Since the authors started keeping records in 1984, no known learning-disabled students have dropped out of Dartmouth. (The college retention rate is 97 percent.)
Diagnosis Two-thirds of the 45 currently enrolled learning-disabled students were diagnosed at Dartmouth. In the fall of 1987, an additional ten freshmen, not counted in the 45, identified themselves as having a learning disability in response to a question about learning disabilities on a postadmission form. More pre-Dartmouth diagnoses may be the coming trend as elementary and high schools become more active in identification and diagnosis. Interestingly, eight of the ten self-identified freshmen went to private schools. Eighty-five percent of the diagnosed students have a language-based disability. The remainder have visual-spatial disorders. Because of the fast-paced audiolingual technique that is used exclusively to teach beginning foreign language courses at Dartmouth, many of the undiagnosed students are discovered because they cannot succeed in their struggle to
280
THE INTERDEPENDENCE OF THEORY AND PRACTICE
meet the college's language requirement. The Rassias method depends on auditory (and, to a lesser extent, visual) short-term memory, the areas of disability for most students. Ratio of Males to Females
Much attention in the literature has been given to the fact that many more males have learning disabilities than females. This is not true at Dartmouth, where the 1988 ratio is 3:2 male to female. In 1986 and 1987, the ratio was 1:1.
Services and A c c o m m o d a t i o n s
Dartmouth does not offer a model college program for learningdisabled students. Many less selective colleges and universities have specific learning-disabilities programs, the elements of which are detailed in commercial college guides found in bookstores (Mangrum and Strichart 1985; Straughn and Colby 1985, for example). When learning-disabled high school students or their parents call the Academic Skills Center to inquire about Dartmouth's "program," we are quick to say that we do not have a specific program. Except for a part-time diagnostician, no one at the college is a specialist in working with learningdisabled students. We do not provide specially trained tutors, nor do we offer separate courses or workshops. The college does not provide any special funds for learning disabilities services other than testing. Though Dartmouth does not have a formal program, nor do most selective and highly selective American colleges and universities (Chaplin, Thum, and Pompian 1988), Dartmouth does comply with Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. Dartmouth does not discriminate against learning- disabled students in its admissions, access to programs and services, or academic or graduation requirements. The college provides reasonable, often generous, accommodations in learning and testing situations and even allows a waiver of the foreign language requirement. Lastly, the college has a 504 coordinator who oversees and guarantees reasonable accommodations for all students with disabilities. In place of a specific program, we have devoted much of our time and energy to accomplishing three tasks: 1) raising the awareness of learning disability issues among the faculty, administration, and students; 2) providing a sympathetic place where undiagnosed and diagnosed learningdisabled students can go; and 3) developing a smooth process whereby students suspected of being learning disabled can be referred for screening and diagnostic testing, then be made aware of what options and accommodations are available to them in a timely way. The goal of all three efforts is to give learning-disabled students the support and guidance they need to succeed at Dartmouth. Dartmouth's system of referral, diagnosis, and accommodation has
DYSLEXIC STUDENTS AT DARTMOUTH
281
been hard won. Whole years have passed before we could persuade the administration to make changes in how students should properly be diagnosed and given reasonable accommodations. Often we felt beleaguered, misunderstood, and frustrated. One can well imagine how many of the faculty and administrators at one of the finest colleges in the country reacted to even the mere suggestion that some students at Dartmouth College have learning disabilities. The first reaction and response most often is, "How did they get accepted?" But persistence, time, and effort, plus the irrefutable data we collected from Dartmouth students, eventually wore down the opposition and slowly converted most of the nonbelievers. Dartmouth's program for its learning-disabled students is most accurately labeled as accommodation rather than remediation. Our experience is that learning-disabled Dartmouth students do not need or ask for much more than what we have recently developed. The college currently provides its learning-disabled students with a supportive, empathic, and advocative place on campus for them to go and know that their difficulties will be understood and where they can discuss ideas for resolving their specific learning difficulties. Most often this means advice on courses and professors, information about enrollment and bureaucratic matters, and assistance in receiving simple accommodations (more time on tests, for example) from professors. The most problematic issues for learning-disabled Dartmouth students are the pressures of time and the heavy academic workload (long reading and regular writing assignments and additional projects in each course). Also, having enough time to demonstrate knowledge and understanding on examinations is a commonly expressed concern for many of the students. Accommodations regarding more time are most commonly worked out between individual students and their professors. We do have an informal support group, much like Brown University's, composed of those students who find it helpful to get together once a month to talk about mutual concerns and share advice with others, especially freshman students. We are currently borrowing from Harvard the idea of inviting speakers to present short talks on topics related to learning disabilities and enlarging the group to include Dartmouth faculty, some of whom are dyslexic, and interested community members.
Referral, Screening, and Diagnostic Procedure Referrals depend upon awareness. We believe our greatest accomplishment has been to develop an institutional process whereby undiagnosed students, experiencing great difficulty in a particular course or discipline, are referred to the Academic Skills Center. Referrals come from faculty members, deans, and less often, the students themselves. Every year, the dean of the college sends a letter to every faculty member de-
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scribing learning disabilities and asking faculty members to refer students suspected of having a learning disability to the Academic Skills Center. The dean also sends every student a descriptive article about learning disabilities, "Like a Volvo Lifted Off My Chest," (Pompian 1986) in the Undergraduate Bulletin. A brochure called "Dyslexia/Learning Disabilities at Dartmouth" is distributed four times a year. Undergraduate advisors receive information from the Academic Skills Center about learning disabilities during their orientation. Last year, the founder of the Landmark schools gave a public lecture on the campus. This year, the faculty talked about learning disabilities in faculty meetings when they were asked to vote on formalizing the granting of language waivers. Next year we hope to take part in the training of undergraduate foreign-language drill instructors. The first step in our referral process occurs when a dean, faculty member, or student calls the Academic Skills Center with a question about a possible learning disability. We reserve an hour to screen students referred to the Academic Skills Center. The notion behind screening is to weed out those students who merely have poor study habits, are underprepared to do Dartmouth College level work, lack goals, or are malingering. Our screening is intended to elicit emotional content as well as factual material. The interview is open-ended. Interestingly, almost all of the students who are referred for screening exhibit the classic characteristics we have found so often signal a learning disability. Students are then referred for diagnostic testing at the student health center. A trained and certified diagnostician conducts a four-hour-long battery of tests and an interview which includes: an adult intelligence test and tests for auditory perception and conceptualization of speech sounds, visual retention, visual-motor integration, visual memory, a complete medical, school, and family history, and an informal writing sample. The diagnostic session is followed within two weeks by a second session, which includes the student, the diagnostician, and staff from the Academic Skills Center. The student is provided with a thorough understanding of his or her diagnosis and given recommendations as to course work and career paths. We refer about 30 students a year to the diagnostician, and 85 percent of these referrals have resulted in a diagnosis of "positive." If the student's insurance company does not reimburse for psychoeducational testing, the college pays for the testing. Students not identified as learning disabled also have a second meeting to discuss the diagnostic evaluation and study strategies. Students admitted to the college fill out a health form that includes a question about learning disabilities. If they self-identify, we send them a letter telling about our services and inviting them to visit. If they feel they require any academic accommodations such as more time on tests or an alternative form of examination, they must have their diagnoses reviewed and approved by the college's learning-disabilities specialist. We are developing a policy on how recent the tests should be. To qualify for review,
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the battery needs to include an intelligence test, perceptual and cognitive tests, a good school history, and an analyzed writing sample. When students self-identify, they are invited to attend support group meetings.
Selective College Symposium In April of 1987, the Academic Skills Center and Dartmouth College, with support from the New England Branch of The Orton Dyslexia Society and the Foundation for Children with Learning Disabilities, hosted a 34-college symposium. The intent of the symposium was to educate other highly selective institutions of post-secondary education who did not have services for or had little awareness of learning-disabled students in their respective colleges and universities. We invited faculty and administrators from all over the United States, many of whom attended--professors, deans, provosts, and attorneys. Some of the colleges sent administrators from academic support centers, health services, disability services, and admissions offices, as well as students. Panel discussions included "Learning Disabilities and the Law," "Symptoms and Manifestations of Learning Disabilities," "Our Academic Experiences" (students from Harvard, Amherst, Cornell, and Dartmouth), "Foreign Languages," "The Admissions Process," and "Providing Support Services." Panelists included faculty members and administrators, learning disabilities specialists, lawyers from colleges, the Office of Civil Rights, and the private sector, and physicians who have specialized in learning disabilities, including Albert Galaburda, M.D., from the Neuroanatomy Laboratory at Beth Israel Hospital in Boston. Dr. Galaburda's slide-lecture was open to the public and drew a large audience. During the few years we have been involved in this issue and, as a result of the Dartmouth symposium, we believe that every college or university, especially highly selective ones that are uneducated about learning disabilities, should begin to develop at the very least the following services and resources: • A specific office clearly identified by the entire institution, staffed by a person who is knowledgeable about learning disabilities and related laws (the Office of Civil Rights of the Department of Education requires that every college receiving federal funds of any kind have a Section 504 Coordinator [Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973]). • A clearly established referral system within the college. • A process for identifying and diagnosing students. • A staff specialist in learning disabilities available for diagnosis and counseling. • College payment for diagnosis, if not covered by insurance. • Campuswide awareness through the college handbook, a specific
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brochure, periodic mailings to students and staff, including a description of the characteristics of a learning disability, and an annual mailing to faculty from the dean. • Academic support personnel trained to recognize the characteristics of a learning disability. • Reasonable accommodations, especially for all-college graduation requirements such as foreign language or math. Examples are additional time on tests and alternative forms of course-content examinations, waivers, and course substitutions. • The collection of data concerning the college's learning-disabled students, including numbers, types of learning disabilities, and case histories.
References Chaplin, K., Thum, C., and Pompian, N. 1988. A Follow-up Survey on Learning Disabilities in Highly Selective Colleges. Unpublished surve~ Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH. Dinklage, Kenneth T. 1971. Inability to Learn a Foreign Language. tn G. Blaine and C. McArthur (eds.). Emotional Problems of the StudenL Second edition. New York: Appleton-Century Crofts. Heiserman, A., Chaplin, K., Pompian, N., and Thum, C. 1986. A Survey on Learning Disabilities in Highly Selective Colleges. Unpublished survey, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH. Mangrum, C. T., and Strichart, S. S. 1985. Peterson's Guide to Colleges with Programs for Learning-Disabled Students. Princeton: Peterson's Guides. Pompian, N. 1986. Like a Volvo Lifted Off My Chest. Undergraduate Bulletin. Dartmouth College. Straughn, C. T., and Colby, M. 1985. Lovejoy's College Guide for the Learning Disabled. New York: Monarch Press.
