Our guest blogger, Josh Wexler, responds to a comment from his previous blog post
How I Became My Own Best Advocate. Read more about how Josh overcame is LD at college.
A few weeks ago I blogged about
becoming my own best advocate in college and then received a comment questioning whether I had disclosed my LD to Dartmouth. Part of the comment states, “One of the biggest mistakes that causes students to fail in college is refusing to disclose their disability, in an attempt to divorce themselves from what they see as a ‘label’. They don't realize there are no labels in college; disclosure is confidential.”
In response: I did disclose the fact that I had a learning disability to Dartmouth. In fact, I had to be retested for my LD, a process which wound up costing thousands of dollars only to reconfirm what I already knew and had proven on past tests. In reference to confidentiality, at Dartmouth at least, you have to personally tell your professors you have a learning disability (which is degrading) and even with documentation, you sometimes have to waste a lot of time proving that your documents are authentic. Needless to say, it is not an easy process and I can understand why some of my peers choose not to disclose their LD to their professors.
Going through Dartmouth with an LD was often challenging, but I was able to learn that having an LD can mean that your path is clearer than most: you are given the gift of knowing where your weaknesses lie. I know that I can’t improve my weaknesses associated with my LD simply by spending more time working on them, like others without an LD may be able to do. Instead I choose to focus on my strengths and
I built a team for success around me that can compliment my strengths and help compensate for my areas of weakness.
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Comments:
Thanks again all for sharing your stories!
Those words still sting. Having to admit to a label you have been running away from your whole life would tear at my confidence. I was so embarassed about my ld that I often would refuse to take my tests at the learning center out of sheer embarassment. I did not want to have to explain to classmates where I was during the test.
Sitting in class was sometimes unbearable. I compare my effect of ld in class to sitting everyday in class listening to a professor speaking a foreign language. I could never understand or comprehend anything.
Whenever I did well on a test or assignment I felt as if I won the lottery. There is no way to explain it. Not only have I taught myself but I have made it through this assignment or exam.
I now have a full time job where I still feel the struggle. I work in the medical field and often times have difficult tasks like any other job. My boss wants said to me (when I asked him to explain something) whats wrong with you do you have a learning disability or something? then laughed. I say this to reiterate the fact that there will always be perils to overcome.
This label has changed my life forever. Everyday seems to be a struggle. But the upside is when I master something there is no greater feeling.
I believe that there is a reason for everything in life. The fact that a learning disablility is a part of us doesn't mean we are not normal, it means we are different.
Whatever you do you have to realize there is nothing you cannot do. The day I graduated from college was the best day of my life. I beat every statistic that was against me, because I believed in myself.
I am earning a second master's degree and find that disclosing is very stigmatizing and I feel very discounted by professors. Educators really need to understand about different types of learners, because I find it very discriminating. It brings me back to the '60's where if you could not learn the way they wanted you to learn, or do things their way, that you were "dumb." What happened to learning from others and diversity? Those of us that are able to achieve and accommodate and work twice as hard as everyone else to do it "their way," are the people that need to wake everyone up for those individuals that are being swept under the carpet that don't have the ability or insight to compensate. Those are the people that are being swept under the carpet and are losing the chance to have better lives, because they are the silent voices of LD's. We are struggling for ourselves and for them.
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