The University Setting

1. Preparing Studentswith LD and AD/HD for Competitive University Settings Beth Rodgers-Kay & Jennifer J. Newton Seventh International Conference on Higher Education and Disability Innsbruck, Austria July 21, 2010

2. TheUniversity Setting

3. Brandeis University Waltham, MA Private research university, focus on liberal arts 3,185 fulltime undergraduates Freshmen in top 10 % of high school class: 82 % Acceptance rate: 32 % Student-to-faculty ratio: 9 to 1 194 Documented Students with LD and/or ADHD Northeastern University Boston, MA Private research university, focus on experiential education 15,521 fulltime undergraduates Freshmen in top 10% of high school class: 50% Acceptance rate: 35% Student-to-faculty ratio: 15 to 1 320 Documented Students with LD and/or ADHD

4. Standard Accommodations: • Letter to faculty • Exams • Notetaking assistance • Referrals/training for adaptive technology • Reduced course load; foreign language substitution

5. Legal compliance or more? • Legal compliance approach • More than compliance

6. How do we Prepare Students for University?

7. Metacognition Self Task Strategies

8. Understanding of self – metacognitive and affective awareness Flexible repertoire of study skills and strategies Within a developmental context A “prepared” college student with LD/ADHD possesses:

9. Metacognitive understanding of mental and emotional state • Emotional intelligence • Developmental issues -- identity -- relationship/intimacy -- differentiation/separation -- vocational/future direction

10. Why does a high-achieving student get to college and fail? • High-achieving high school student achieves under specific conditions. Take these conditions away, and … • Why might a successful high school student struggle or fail at college?

11. How can we get students ready: metacognitive conversations • Analyze university setting for obstacles to LD/ADHD • Consider individual student’s profile

12. Curricular factors • Volume and pace of the coursework • Course load, i.e., number of courses • Course balance, i.e., papers vs. exams • Choice of major or program

13. More curricular considerations • Strong high school science/math may not translate to strong college sciences • Applied, experiential courses • Abstract, theoretical study • Daily homework/discipline versus short, “bursts” towards a product

14. Environmental factors • Absence of structure to the day • Absence of routines • Missing environmental cues to what students need to do, when, how, and that they can do it • Less feedback (grades or evaluative comments)

15. Student’s individual profile • Strengths and weaknesses • Interests, choices, motivations • Mental health

16. Mental health • Medications • Changing medication or doctor in weeks/months before college • Therapist/relationship

17. Mental health • What to do, how to seek help if/when something emerges • Self-care • Exercise • Sleep • Regulating internet and video games

18. How does student profile match curricular, environmental challenges? Student’s Challenges of profileuniversity setting

19. Reality check • This preparation is not typical at the high school level. • Students arrive at college, but they are not prepared. • Often, students are not ready to entertain the conversation until after they arrive at college.

20. Metacognitive Dialogue

21. Practices to initiate the metacognitive process • Initial meetings with prospective students, and/or the intake appointment

22. Practices to initiate the metacognitive process B. One-on-one meetings on a regular, continuing basis

23. Case study 1: compensatory versus strategic • Student has practiced effective compensatory skill for reading comprehension. He re-reads and takes notes to ensure he’s understanding. • Determined to do well, he uses this compensatory skill – only to fall hopelessly behind on his reading for the course.

24. Compensatory vs. strategic • Needs to work more quickly – but, he doesn’t know how, and he is inflexible about trying a new strategy. • He earns strong grades on the first assignments, but doesn’t complete later assignments and fails the course… • A skill that worked in high school fails in the new context.

25. Case study 2: Anxiety derails effective skills • High-achiever with language-based LD. • Very stressed when has multiple deadlines/exams in same week. • Reaches point when he is too discouraged to continue working, feels panicky.

26. Anxiety derails… • Student observes that he writes better on essay exams (time constraints, but he receives extended time) than on papers. • Under time constraints, he focuses on writing well without too much concern for spelling, transitions, etc. • When there is no time constraint, he falls into perfectionist behaviors – editing/revising as he writes.

27. Anxiety derails… • His habit to edit/revise is a compensatory skill that’s been reinforced – but, is not used effectively at this stage of writing. • We review why revising is a secondary stage of the writing process. • But, this tendency/behavior comes about under stress – so it requires a new level of metacognitive understanding.

28. Case study 3: What is needed? • Student knows she benefits from structure, and breaking long-term projects down into shorter, intermediary steps. • We discover she does not know how to do that for herself.

29. What is needed? • She asked her professor for a deadline extension on a paper for her archeology course. She got the extension, but she still didn’t know how to write the paper – • What she needed to ask for was a template, or an example of the paper (from a previous student, previous course.)

30. Student’s use of metacognitive knowledge… • Anticipate task/difficulty • Develop effective strategy • Reflect and fine-tune strategy • Learn from experience

31. A developing metacognitive process – necessary preparation for college-bound student with LD and/or ADHD.

32. Questions?

33. Thank you! Jennifer J. Newton j.newton@neu.edu Beth Rodgers-Kay brodgers@brandeis.edu