Accommodations
We have a concrete explainer of reasonable accommodation that you should read first.
Am I Marginalized or Just Stupid?
Many neurodivergent students struggle in university because we do not think like most of our peers.
As a result, many students who should end up graduate school end up underperforming.
Many students do not realize how valuable their superstrengths are in specialized contexts
- Neurominorities are specialists, not generalists (Bouckley 2022).
- Undergraduate degrees are largely built for generalists, but a good graduate program is made to be specialized.
- A thesis-based graduate program where the goal is mastery and to produce new work ought to be an endeavor involving creative thinking and specialization that is more appropriate for neurodivergent superstrengths.1
Graduate school may actually be easier for you if the goal is a thesis where you have to create something which has never been done before on a topic you’re passionate about.
Understanding your strengths, what your options actually mean for you, and learning to self advocate is an important step towards hitting key developmental phases in your career, even though the way talent is signalled and assessed may not be appropriate for someone with your talents and interests.
You may be meant for a highly-skilled position that makes bank, but you need to do some accessible strategizing to figure out how to make sure you get there.
Creative Accommodations
- Being prepared to repeat instructions.
- Writing explanations down in office hours if you’re unable to focus at that time.
- Advanced access to meeting agendas.
Arguments That Professors Usually Respond To
- “I would like to get credit for my work.”
References
Footnotes
Not every program will be like this, but academia is the space where you are supposed to find this, so pick your program and advisor wisely.↩︎