The Hidden Cost of Good Grades
The parents of a fifth-grade girl in Montgomery County came to us concerned about their daughter’s homework habits. She was earning good grades, but the cost was becoming impossible to ignore. She spent excessive hours each night completing assignments, often working late into the evening. The parents noticed increasing frustration, anxiety, and withdrawal from family activities. Homework had consumed their evenings and was affecting their daughter’s mental health.
The 504 Eligibility Meeting
At an initial 504 eligibility meeting, the school team told the family that good grades meant the student did not need evaluations and did not qualify for a 504 plan. This is not true. Grades are just one indicator of educational impact, and often not a very good one. They do not capture the effort, time, or emotional toll required to achieve them, nor do they consider other effects the disability is having on the student’s ability to concentrate or learn.
The attorneys at Joseph and Rabb met with the family and really dug into what was happening with this student. It turned out that teachers had mentioned verbally to the parents that the student showed signs of inattention during class.
With our advice, another meeting was held, this time, with the parents providing detailed written concerns and documentation of what they had heard from teachers and what they were seeing at home. The attorney attended a 504 meeting with the family. We ensured the 504 team conducted appropriate assessments and implemented the broad interpretation of eligibility criteria as required under Section 504. The school evaluated her and completed ADHD rating scales as part of their assessment. Girls with ADHD are often overlooked because they tend not to exhibit the same “externalizing” stereotypical behaviors that younger boys do. Their symptoms are more internalized, which means identification often takes longer. By fifth grade, many girls have developed compensatory strategies that mask their difficulties, but the effort required to maintain those strategies takes a significant toll.
We reminded the 504 team that a student does not need to fail academically to qualify. The law protects students whose disabilities substantially limit major life activities, including learning, concentrating, and completing tasks.
Demonstrating the True Impact
We showed the school team documentation of how much frustration homework was producing. The parents had tracked the hours spent each evening, the emotional struggles, and the student’s feelings of frustration with how long it took her to finish everything. We also highlighted the teacher observations of inattention during class, the school’s own ADHD rating scale results, and the outside therapist’s anxiety diagnosis. All of this information was part of the record and supported the need for accommodations despite the strong performance on grades.
Students with ADHD can take longer to complete assignments for different reasons. Sometimes it’s processing speed. Sometimes it’s having a hard time concentrating, and sometimes it’s frustration with repeatedly demonstrating mastery of a skill over and over. It is important to identify what each individual student is dealing with in order to know how to help them. For this student the problem was two-fold: she wasn’t able to concentrate for as long as her peers, making each task take longer than expected, and she was frustrated by doing similar work over and over when she had already mastered the material. Frustration with repetitive tasks is a fairly common trait for bright students with ADHD.
Accommodations That Made a Difference
With our assistance, the Montgomery County 504 team ultimately found the child eligible for accommodations. One key accommodation addressed a common challenge for bright students with ADHD: once they have demonstrated mastery of a concept, continuing with repetitive problems serves no educational purpose and creates unnecessary frustration. The plan specified that the student could demonstrate mastery with a reduced number of problems, and once mastery was shown, she would not be required to complete additional repetitive work. This way concentration doesn’t have to be maintained for hours at a time, but the teacher still has evidence that the student knows the material.
For example, if the student correctly completed 10 math problems showing she understood the concept, she would not be required to complete all 20 problems on the worksheet. Demonstration of mastery was sufficient. This accommodation alone significantly reduced the student’s frustration and homework time while maintaining academic standards.
Additional accommodations addressed the anxiety and inattention. Seating away from common distractions, breaks during longer tasks, and regular check-ins to monitor anxiety levels were incorporated.
Results and Family Impact
After the 504 plan was implemented, the family saw meaningful changes. Homework time decreased to age-appropriate levels. The student’s anxiety lessened, and family evenings were no longer dominated by fighting over assignment completion. Good grades were maintained, but without the hidden cost that had brought the family to us initially.
This case illustrates an important principle: students do not need to fail academically to deserve support under Section 504. When a disability creates barriers that require disproportionate effort to overcome, accommodations are appropriate regardless of the final grade. For bright students with ADHD, acknowledging that concentration issues mean that some tasks take longer for them than for some of their peers, as well as allowing them to demonstrate mastery and then stop recognizes their learning needs without lowering expectations. The 504 plan leveled the playing field.
About the author
Nicole Joseph is a special education attorney at The Law Offices of Joseph & Rabb. She has spent 22 years advocating for children with disabilities, first representing hundreds of children at Disability Rights Maryland and now in private practice, with a particular focus on twice-exceptional students and on children whose disabilities are masked by their own compensatory strategies. She is also a parent who has been through the special education process.
About The Law Offices of Joseph & Rabb
The attorneys of the Law Offices of Joseph & Rabb have represented Maryland students and families for more than twenty years. In addition to the hundreds of children we have represented, our attorneys helped write school discipline regulations used across the state, consulted on the Ready to Read Act which ensures that young children in Maryland are screened for reading concerns, have served as members of the boards of educational nonprofits, and are members of the Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates. Every one of us has also been a parent navigating this system.