Accommodations vs. Achievement

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How many of you get no accomodations/minimal accomodations (extra time when needed, but no particular modification in the curriculum) and still get very high marks in school?

Last edited by MathGirl on 30 Mar 2010, 12:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I had no accomodations in school and still got very high marks.
Although, given my IQ scores I was still considered to be "underachieving" for my abilities and they were forever on my case about that.

My son is going into high school next year, and he has an IEP, but the only accomodation will be extra time on tests. We get offers from teachers to make accomodations, i.e. less homework than peers, but we figure a future boss won't give our son accomodations -- so we don't want to start that. It's been hard this year, past years have been much easier (when meds were working -- they aren't working this year), but we "hear" that eighth grade in our area is awful, and things calm down in 9th grade. I sure hope so, for our son's sake.

Although it is my understanding that the teachers have attended seminars on autism, I have no special accommodations and I do just fine in high school. I would say my marks class as "above average", overall.

Work hard in advance and revise like hell before the exam. If that still doesn't get the marks you want, then try getting a tutor or a revision book.

I agree with the others here, it is not necessary to get accomodations to get high marks. Life won't give you special treatment forever, so it is better to learn to cope without them from the word go.

Even if that means you never get the grades you were hoping for, in the long run, it might be for the best- I've seen people scrape into high-pressure courses due to special treatment, only to drop out a month or so later when they couldn't cope with the workload.

That's very true. I've been offered help before (and possibly accomodations), but I refused them simply because I wanted to see if I would be able to get the highest mark in all of my classes with sheer hard work. I didn't understand how some of my classmates could go out to socialize and have jobs in their spare time and get outstanding grades, while I spent almost all of my time studying and got low average to very high grades, depending on the subject. Now that I know that I have special needs, I work even harder, because I understand that it takes me longer to process things and it's not because I'm stupid, which is what I thought before. I used to be really depressed because of that. I did not apply to university last year just because I was so worn out, scared, and felt unprepared. However, working hard has become my habit. Going to university this year, I will first request as little accomodation as possible, try my best, and see how it goes.

The reason why I've posted this thread is to see how many other people on the spectrum were able to succeed in school without any accomodations. And by succeed, I mean being able to get averages of 80 percent and above.

Fair play to you. That work ethic will really stand you well in university, so I wouldn't be surprised if you actually had less difficulty adjusting than some of your peers.

And don't worry about working more than thanyour classmates at the moment. Half the people in high school you see claiming to 'wing it' are in fact cramming like crazy the week before exams. The other half are in for a serious shock once they move past high school.



80% is a great mark in high school, but (depending on your course) considered an extremely high achievement in college. Don't fret if you don't get this kind of mark; a pass grade is all you need for the first couple of years and anything extra is a bonus

I've never had accomodations, and the only thing holding my back from getting the kinds of grades I want is my own laziness and procrastination.

I got decent marks in high school without special accomodations. As for university, different story.

I got no accommodations when I was in school and I still got very high grades. I was usually the one with the highest grades in the class/school. Learning academic things has always come easily to me and it's not like my social life has ever gotten in the way.

I wonder if this is maybe a part of the reason why I wasn't diagnosed until adulthood. I got good grades in school and didn't have any major behavioral issues, so nobody worried much or paid much attention to what was happening, despite me being completely incompetent when it came to socializing, making friends, communicating and such.

We have taken the same approach with our 9 year old son. Every problem he faces presents an opportunity to develop a coping skill or request an accomodation. We have an IEP, but haven't used any special accomodations other than social skills training. The accommodations are there if he needs them, kind of like a safety net because he can encounter problems that snowball very fast.

I'm not diagnosed, so I got no accommodations. I did very well in high school -- if I liked the teacher.

wow, I wish I had your luck. I had accomodation and shite marks and worse comments from my second year of higschool on 'til the end and to ice the cake even with my specific accomodations(up to double time, seperate/isolated quiet workspace on test/quizes/exams and a computer to do written components+ soft copy versions of tests administered in either word or kurzweil format) I stil flunked out of one semester of a genetal arts diploma and even with course load reduction on top of all the other accomodations I still flunked out of maybe accumulated a third of a semester of business school.

Hmm... I'm just wondering, why do some people with AS struggle so much with academics? I thought it was supposed to be our strongest suit.

The only real deterrent for me is my processing speed while reading the material. When it comes to listening, I zone out easily, but then I come home and work through the material after taking a loong break to get rid of sensory-caused stress. I procrastinate a lot due to the exhaustion that the sensory overload of school brings, but if I were to study on my own, I would definitely be way more productive.

At the same time, my marks are still high. I do all my work, albeit at a very slow pace, and try to participate in class as much as possible.

I had similar experiences in school. I didn't learn much in class by following a lecture. I would learn by studying on my own in my own quirky manner.

What I couldn't do is have balance in my life. I didn't make any friends in college. I found success only when I was 100% committed to school. When I tried to incorporate other interests into my routine (e.g., a video game, working out) these other interests would often distract my ability to study and it would be difficult to get back to the 100% focus I needed to study successfully--it could takes weeks or months of trying to get it back. Even with 100% committment to school, I have never had consistent control over my mind and its obsessive focusing.

As a result, my grades were straight As when I was on my game, Ds and Fs when I wasn't. The time and effort were always the same, but the lack of consistent focus was frustrating. I even had one semester where I studied successfully the whole semester, but my focus went somewhere else right before finals and I bombed every test. I sat there staring at the tests, but my mind just wouldn't lock in on the questions.

I know that many people here with AS have bigger problems than I did when it comes to school work. Among other problems, if a person with AS is not interested in school, has outside distractions or simply cannot control their obsessions, then school can be frustrating.

Yes. I wasn't diagnosed until this year, but even now, I'm not looking for academic accommodations. I have a good GPA and will be doing honors. The quality of my work has never been a problem, but I have trouble focusing on work, remembering all the assignments I have, and remembering when to turn them in. Because I prioritize my schoolwork, it still gets done, but nothing else does, and I have no life. I have no formal extracurricular activities, and I feel bad about that because at my university, most students are very involved in extracurriculars. Instead, I read, hang out with my friends, and do a LOT of stuff online. I hope to become organized enough soon to be able to go more places, do more things, maybe even join a club or two.