Ruling: MCAT must adapt for learning disabled

Students who sued say the California decision could move other testing agencies to provide similar arrangements. The AAMC plans to appeal.

By Myrle Croasdale, AMNews staff. Nov. 27, 2006.

California medical school hopefuls with learning disabilities may find it easier to get extra testing time for the Medical College Admission Test.

California's Superior Court of Alameda County ruled in October that the Assn. of American Medical Colleges, which administers the MCAT, must use the state's broader version of the federal Americans with Disabilities Act when determining if people diagnosed with learning disorders such as dyslexia or attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder are entitled to special accommodations.

"Hopefully, the suspicion that I faced when I applied for accommodations on the MCAT will go away and people with learning disabilities will now be able to take the MCAT and other national tests on a level playing field with their nondisabled peers," said Brendan Pierce, one of the four students diagnosed with learning disabilities who sued the AAMC in 2004 for denying them accommodations.

Robert Burgoyne, a Washington, D.C., attorney who represented the AAMC, said the decision, if it stands, erodes the MCAT's value.

"Ultimately, what's at stake is the usefulness of MCAT scores to medical schools," Burgoyne said. "The whole point of having the MCAT is to provide medical schools with an objective measure to compare applicants."

The AAMC, which uses the ADA's more stringent definition of disabled, told the court that giving extra time for the test altered the standardized conditions that make MCAT scores uniform and may give an unfair advantage to students receiving it.