Why are 38 percent of Stanford students saying they're disabled?
94 comments
·December 4, 2025shetaye
lostmsu
I suppose cheating to get housing benefits is less of a dumpster fuck vs cheating to get ahead of other people in education.
hibikir
I think there's a non-malicious explanation for a percentage of this.
As I grew up in the 80s, there were two kinds of gifted kids in school: The kind that would ace everything anyway, and the kind that, for a variety of reasons, lacked the regulation abilities to manage the school setting well, with the slow classes and such. A lot of very smart people just failed academically, because the system didn't work for them. Some of those improved their executive function enough as they went past their teenage years, and are now making a lot of money in difficult fields.
So what happens when we do make accomodations to them? That their peaky, gifted performance comes out, they don't get ejected by the school systems anywhere near as often as they were before, and now end up in top institutions. Because they really are both very smart and disabled at the same time.
you can even see this in tech workplaces: The percentages of workers that are neurodivergent is much higher than usual, but it's not as if tech hires them out of compassion, but because there's a big cadre or neurodivergent people that are just in the line where they are very productive workers anyway. So it should be no surprise that in instutitutions searching for performance, the number of people that qualify for affordances for certain mental disabilities just goes way up.
That's not to say that there cannot be people that are just cheating, but it doesn't take much time in a class with gifted kids to realize that no, it's not just cheating. You can find someone, say, suffering in a dialectic-centric english class, where just following the conversation is a problem, while they are outright bored with the highest difficulty technical AP classes available, because they find them very easy.
mapontosevenths
> Because they really are both very smart and disabled at the same time.
I agree with almost everything you say here. However, I wanted to point out that you make the same mistake the articles author does. "Disabled" and "Diagnosed" are not actually the same thing, even though we do describe ADHD and the like as "learning disabilities."
Being diagnosed with a learning disability or other type of neuro-divergency does not automatically entitle someone to special treatment. The vast majority of that 38% are likely just "diagnosed" people who are asking for no special treatment at all.
That doesn't fit the authors narrative, or trigger the human animals "unfairness" detector though so it makes a far less interesting article.
lostmsu
> The percentages of workers that are neurodivergent is much higher than usual
Is it much though? 38%? I haven't seen one in 15 years across 5+ different companies.
> there's a big cadre or neurodivergent people that are just in the line where they are very productive workers anyway
Alternatively, it just became popular to label others or oneself that way. And tech elites have nothing better to do in free time. Also DEI benefits! Who else would be allowed a medical break due to a burnout and stress?
OGEnthusiast
American society is at the point where if you don't play these sort of games/tricks, you'll get out-competed by those who do. Bleak.
acedTrex
Basic game theory at work right there. You only need a few bad apples to cause the entire system to devolve.
Rebuff5007
Thats true, but I think the blame is more on "American society" and not the kids working through the system.
50 years ago, college was cheaper. From what I understand getting jobs if you had a college degree was much easier. Social media didn't exist and people weren't connected to a universe of commentary 24/7. Kids are dealing with all this stuff, and if requesting a "disability accommodation" is helping them through it, that seems fine?
OGEnthusiast
Indeed, it's much more reflective of American society in 2025 than it is of the individual students (or even Stanford in general).
p1esk
Pretty sure it was always like this
SoftTalker
No, "disability" used to be something of a stigma. Now it's celebrated, and people proudly identify with it.
If you're saying that people always try to game the system, whatever it is, then I agree however.
hattmall
>If you're saying that people always try to game the system, whatever it is, then I agree however.
This isn't even true either. In the past there was a huge emphasis and effort made toward character. Going out of your way to do the right thing and be helpful and NOT getting special treatment but choosing the difficult path.
Now everything is the opposite it's about getting as much special treatment as possible and shirking as much responsibility and this isn't just people it's throughout the corporate and political system as well.
Barrin92
True but I don't think that's out of the norm. The upper echelons of American society always consisted of a bunch of fake status games and abuses, a legacy admission is basically a socially accepted form of disability. Or non-ability, I guess.
America never had a rigorous meritocratic national system of education, it's a kind of half developed country in that sense that became democratic before it modernized (that is to say patronage survived) so you have this weird combination of family clans, nepo babies and networks competing with people who are where they are based on their performance.
alwa
But, like—isn’t the bleaker thing that that seems so existential of an outcome? The vast majority don’t go to Stanford. The vast majority of those aren’t valedictorian.
And the vast majority of that vast majority’s lives in the US work out, you know, fine—mostly including things like climate-controlled indoor spaces, ample calories, professional medical care, access to some kind of justice system, going their whole life without participating in war…
lotsofpulp
> And the vast majority of that vast majority’s lives in the US work out, you know, fine—mostly including things like climate-controlled indoor spaces, ample calories,
I’ll buy this
>professional medical care, access to some kind of justice system,
I doubt this. Most people in the US are probably aware one healthcare or legal issue in their family will derail the whole family’s future.
That is not to say things are worse than before. But humans view the world in relative terms, and they seem to expect more than reality can offer. And whereas before there was ignorance, today, there is widespread knowledge and visibility into the gulf between the have nots, the haves, and the have even mores.
OGEnthusiast
> And the vast majority of that vast majority’s lives in the US work out, you know, fine—mostly including things like climate-controlled indoor spaces, ample calories, professional medical care, access to some kind of justice system, going their whole life without participating in war
By those metrics yes, but not by the more important metrics IMO of: buying a house, having a stable job, starting a family, etc.
skzjxhz
Low trust society which is downstream of diversity. This is a tale as old (democracy ends in oligarchy came from Socrates? One of them) as time but somehow we thought it’d be different this time around. Obama had a book about how diverse democracies never work on his summer reading list - I’m guessing as some kind of cruel joke.
Things weren’t perfect, but they were a lot better.
aynyc
I don't know about Stanford students' actual disability, so I can't say much to that. I went to shitty high school and decent middle school in relatively poor middle class neighborhood. Now, I live in a wealthy school district. The way parents in the two different neighborhood treat "learning disability" is mind blowing.
In my current school district, IEP (Individual Education Program) is assigned to students that need help, and parents are actively and explicitly ask for it, even if the kids are borderline. Please note that, this doesn't take away resource for regular kids, in fact, classrooms with IEP student get more teachers so everyone in that class benefits. IEP students are also assigned to regular classroom so they are not treated differently and their identities aren't top secret. Mind you, the parents here can easily afford additional help if needed.
In other neighborhood, a long time family friend with two young children, the older one doesn't talk in school, period. Their speech is clearly behind. The parents refuse to have the kids assign IEP and insist that as long as the child is not disruptive, there is no reason to do so. Why the parents don't want to get help, because they feel the older child will get labelled and bullied and treated differently. The older child hates school and they are only in kindergarten. Teachers don't know what to do with the child.
weehobbes
I have a teenager who is at an academically rigorous college prep school. He is incredibly bright and one of the best students in the school. But he has an accommodation in math for extra time because he has a form of dyscalculia which makes him very prone to misreading and mixing up in working memory the numbers, symbols and other formulas. He understands all the concepts well, but his disability results in calculation/mechanical errors unless he has the extra time to check his work multiple times for these errors. I believe this kind of disability and accommodation is legitimate, but I understand why others may disagree. He even says he often feels guilty for getting extra time when others don't. I am sure there are also people who abuse the system and get accommodations when then don't actually need them.
pavel_lishin
> the current language of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) allows students to get expansive accommodations with little more than a doctor's note.
Isn't that... good? What else would be expected if you have a disability, and need accomodations?
bvisness
The Reason article leaves out some helpful context from the original Atlantic article:
> In 2013, the American Psychiatric Association expanded the definition of ADHD. Previously, the threshold for diagnosis had been “clear evidence of clinically significant impairment.” After the release of the DSM‑5, the symptoms needed only to “interfere with, or reduce the quality” of, academic functioning.
So it's dramatically easier to get said doctor's note these days.
mapontosevenths
Being diagnosed with the disorder does not automatically qualify as a disability. This article, and many people in this thread seem not to be able to distinguish between the rising rate of diagnoses, and being disabled or needing accommodation.
I have been diagnosed as being several different types of neuro-divergent, but I am also not qualified as disabled and do not need or want any special dispensation. I would say that I have been relatively successful in life by almost anyone's metrics without it.
There is still an enormous advantage in understanding yourself, even without the expectation of accommodation or medication. I was also, sadly, not diagnosed until my mid-40's.
I would have had a much easier time getting to where I am today if diagnostic criteria and awareness among clinical staff were better when I was younger.
almosthere
If it turns out half of all people have something, it's just normal human stuff. Today's ADHD is likely a symptom of tiktoking your brain's serotonin out or some other chemical
missinglugnut
Nonsense. This is Stanford. The admissions process filtered for highly academically successful students and then 38% of them claimed a disability which impairs their academic performance. It's bullshit of the most obvious kind.
jandrewrogers
The necessary doctor's note can be trivially purchased without any meaningful evidence of disability. I know a number of children of wealthy families with these notes. They don't even pretend to be disabled, possession of the note makes it beyond question.
Buying an advantage for your children in this way is widespread. This article suggests that it is even more widespread than I imagined.
pavel_lishin
So, let's say we make it more difficult to get "proof" of disability, something that requires more than just a doctor's note.
Won't these rich people also be able to trivially acquire these, while people who actually need accomodations will continue to struggle because it's difficult to prove they need something?
this_user
Any system that can be gamed will be gamed.
zubiaur
I would think so too. There is something else going though. It a system that relies partly on trust. A sort of moral asset with herd effects. It’s a system that can tolerate a certain amount of gaming, but when the threshold is surpassed, it becomes a failed system. It has to change, to the detriment of the justly entitled.
And that is the sad part, when that unstated assumption, that one may not lie, is broken past a threshold, it increases the transaction cost for everyone.
swatcoder
That's exactly the dilemma.
Offering accommodations to people with disabilities is good. So you do that.
Then you recognize that not all disabilities that deserve accommodations are obvious so you establish some bureaucratic process that can certify people with these unobvious disabilities so they can receive the accommodations you meant for them to.
But the people you delegate to issue those certificates are... well, they're people. Some of them are not so discerning, some of them are not so bright, some of take pleasure in gaming the system or playing Robin Hood, some of them accept bribes and trade favors, some of them are averse to conflict.
Next thing you know, you've got a lot of people with certificates saying that they have unobvious disabilities that grant them accommodations. Like, way more than you would have expected and some whose certified disabilities are really unobvious.
Might the genuinely good system you put in place have been abused? How can you know? What can you do? And if it's not been gamed, then what the heck is going on that sooooo many people are disabled? That seems like it would reflect some kind of social crisis itself.
rovr138
Okay, the oposite would be, you put a stringent process on how to measure things. You have rigorous testing. These all take time and money, including lost income in time you need to take away, and money paid for the testing.
And you end up with people that could have had help to be successful, and not they're not being able to operate within the constraints.
So, what do you do then?
> then what the heck is going on that sooooo many people are disabled
Good question. We should study this and figure what the fuck we are messing up as a society... if only we had funding and also we had someone that could act with the findings and take action.
Looks like Stanford might be a good place to start. How's their funding situation?
invalidOrTaken
once expertise can drive benefits, expertise becomes a target for corruption
weirdly: if you want good scientists, don't listen to them!
bluefirebrand
It is probably not good if nearly half (38% qualifies as nearly half, right?) of students are considered disabled and needing accommodations, right?
Surely nearly half of any given public population can't be disabled?
rovr138
25% of Americans have a disability, https://www.cdc.gov/disability-and-health/media/pdfs/disabil...
We don't know what's the percentage broken down by age.
If 38% is almost 50%, 25% is almost 38%.
almosthere
My dad at 50 got a disabled parking placard. He did have knee surgery, but he really didn't struggle with it about 4 months after his surgery. I asked him why he still had it - I got the impression that at this point he wanted his priority parking spot anyway. Didn't like driving around with him much after that.
SilasX
That's over the entire population, which includes the elderly. For the 18-34yo block, it's 8.3%, and you'd probably expect it even lower for ... well, the population that, to put it bluntly, succeeded in life enough to get into Stanford.
https://www.census.gov/library/visualizations/2024/comm/disa...
Edit: And to clarify, just to be fair, I can accept there are many things that would qualify as "a disability that the education system should care about" but which don't rise to the level of the hard binary classification of "disabled" that would show up in government stats. I'm just saying that the overall 25% figure isn't quite applicable here.
bananalychee
Even 5% would be pushing it at a university. It's easy today to get a diagnosis for something like mild ADHD whether one has it or not, and everyone is on some kind of spectrum. Legitimacy aside, classifying mild, manageable conditions as disabilities that require special accommodations and/or medication is counter-productive long-term.
rovr138
Who are you to say what should be included or not, that something can be gauged as mild or not, and that there should be a treshold?
cynicalpeace
They're quite obviously not.
They're lying so they can get unlimited time on the test and/or look at their phone.
They're smart kids that see a loophole in the system. They will take advantage!
acedTrex
> They're smart kids that see a loophole in the system. They will take advantage!
This is just not an acceptable cultural viewpoint. Abusing a permissive system must be discouraged.
skywhopper
You clearly know nothing about how these accommodations are handled.
bluefirebrand
Right. What I'm saying is that we've probably screwed up by creating a system that incentivizes people to "be disabled" even if they really are stretching the definition of disabled
skywhopper
Most everyone has some disability or other. Just because you may work around it or not think of it that way, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.
null
delichon
If 38% of the top 1% of students have learning disabilities then I'd expect students near the mean to be 100% learning disabled, if those words have any meaning left.
jancsika
You are implicitly hard-coupling work ethic and ease of learning. Especially in the U.S., it is within the realm of possibility that the students near the mean possess a comparative ease of learning but value that advantage at roughly 0%.
everdrive
I was sure you were going to say "then it follows that the top 0.1% must be 100% learning disabled."
alwa
Aren’t some of these “accommodations” for “disabilities” things as simple as, like, asking their professors not to put them on the spot in class if they have crippling social anxiety? Because while that might “toughen up” some people, with this person, that technique amounts to just punching them in the face for no constructive purpose?
How much of this is a terminology problem—that the word “disability” serves this blanket purpose for statutory reasons rather than to signal the type or severity of impairment?
Like, at the end of the day, these students still have to perform or not. I get the impression that a lot of these accommodations are kind of just a formal way of not being a dick about obstacles tangential to the actual learning.
OneDeuxTriSeiGo
I went to the university half way through my undergrad to file for a disability because I have ADHD and I go through short periods where my medication just stops being effective for whatever reason.
It's not a major disability but it was a barrier to me performing at my best so I filed the paperwork and got some minor accommodations. It was basic stuff like letting teachers know during periods when I was struggling and they would allow me to take tests in a separate room (same time limit, just by my self in a quiet room) or allow me an extra 24 hours on certain assignments provided I requested it X amount of days ahead of time.
Certainly they provided a minor "advantage" but not substantially. And these were things that most teachers are already generally willing to accommodate regardless of disability but the disability system provides a formal framework for doing so and avoiding the justifying yourself over and over again (vs just getting it cleared up at the start of the semester).
Disabilities come in many shapes and sizes. Most of them are small and it's way easier to deal with an office that deals specially with disabilities to come up with accommodations that make sense for you and keep them consistent across your entire time at university than it does to try and negotiate terms with every single professor or TA.
morkalork
Maybe they're all that academically gifted kinda autism and students near the mean are less likely to be disabled? /s
Brybry
I know you did /s but in public school gifted programs here the gifted kids have IEPs (a document defining their Individualized Education Program) similar to what is required for special education kids with disabilities.
wongarsu
I can't talk about Stanford, but STEM-related jobs (including software engineering) certainly seem to be full of people with ADHD, autism and related "neurodivergances"
I wouldn't be surprised if most of these Stanford cases are people gaming the system. But I would be equally unsurprised if screening all students of elite universities revealed that over 50% of them had some condition listed in the DSM-5, with clear correlations between condition and field of study
oefrha
> "It's just not. It's rich kids getting extra time on tests." Talented students get to college, start struggling, and run for a diagnosis to avoid bad grades.
Okay, I was an undergrad at Stanford a decade ago, I graduated with two majors (math, physics) and almost another minor (CS) so I took more credits than most and sat in more tests than most, and I don’t think I’ve seen a single person given extra time on tests; and some of the courses had more than a hundred people in them, with test takers almost filling the auditorium in Hewlett Teaching Center if memory serves. Article says the stat “has grown at a breathtaking pace” “over the past decade and half” and uses “at UC Berkeley, it has nearly quintupled over the past 15 years” as a shocking example, so I would assume the stat was at least ~10% at Stanford a decade ago. So where were these people during my time? Only in humanities? Anyone got first hand experience?
rovr138
Or it wasn't diagnosed, defined, or the diagnosis wasn't good. Doesn't mean that they weren't there.
oefrha
TFA is specifically about students claiming disabilities to get extra time on tests. I’m saying from first hand experience that I didn’t know a single instance of anyone getting extra time on tests, and wondering where those alleged instances were occurring. Anything that “wasn’t diagnosed, defined, or the diagnosis wasn’t good” (huh?) has nothing to do with the 38% stat, or anything else in the article, really.
windows_hater_7
Does this number include housing accommodations? They are provided through the same disability office. I have dry eye disease, and when the relative humidity was 19% in my dorm room I requested an accommodation to have a humidifier. I’m sure that type of accommodation wouldn’t have been approved in the past.
pavon
This focuses on students seeking diagnoses. But I would expect most of them have already been diagnosed long before college. Parents with high expectations of their children are more likely to seek diagnoses. If you've spent your childhood being told you are ADHD and on Ritalin, then it is natural you would self-identify as such in college.
zamalek
> The students at America's elite universities are supposed to be the smartest, most promising young people in the country. And yet, shocking percentages of them are claiming academic accommodations designed for students with learning disabilities.
What the actual... Lack of journalistic integrity rears its head once again. Executive function and social challenges do not make a person "not smart."
Going back to the core of the problem, I feel that this does need to be controlled. It's one thing to disability signal online to gain clout, it's a completely different thing to drain resources from genuinely disabled folks. Disabilities need to come with diagnoses.
georgeecollins
Maybe the smartest, most promising young people in the country realize it is smart to claim a disability.
I am not saying they don't have one. I am saying some people have realized ways it helps to point it out and maybe not everyone is clued into that.
ixwt
Timed tests encourage wrote memorization and reflexive knowledge. They don't encourage what is reflective of the modern real world knowledge recollection. In almost all scenarios, you have a book to reference for knowledge, much less search engines (and now LLMs). Almost nothing is memorized today, in the work world. What you know, in my experience, comes from frequent usage. Your timespan to work on most things is on the order of days, not minutes or an hour.
Tests should be open book, open notes, and an extensive amount of time to do the test. The questions should be such that they demonstrate an understanding of the material, not just how well you can parrot back information.
Whilst I would love tests to be open internet, this lends itself to very easy cheating. The material being taught and what notes you take about it should be enough to answer any questions posed to you about the material. Especially those that demonstrate an understanding of the material.
Regarding Stanford specifically, I did not see the number broken down by academic or residential disability (in the underlying Atlantic article). This is relevant, because
> Some students get approved for housing accommodations, including single rooms and emotional-support animals.
buries the lede, at least for Stanford. It is incredibly commonplace for students to "get an OAE" (Office of Accessible Education) exclusively to get a single room. Moreover, residential accommodations allow you to be placed in housing prior to the general population and thus grant larger (& better) housing selection.
I would not be surprised if a majority of the cited Stanford accommodations were not used for test taking but instead used exclusively for housing (there are different processes internally for each).