We are looking at section 504 for our 13 year old son. He is in the 7th grade. He has ADHD/ODD. He is very bright and probably smarter than I am but he refuses to do homework! He is still way behind in 2 of his classes just due to not handing in assignments. This is frustrating because he has NO problems understanding the assignments and could do them with very little effort. He gets pretty much all A's and B's on the stuff he hands in but is still battling almost straight F's just because he doesn't do homework assignments. Another problem he is having with school is that half of the assignments he does do never find their way to the teacher because he losses them! We had all of his math assignments caught up! He had about 10 or 12 assignments we had to BATTLE to get completed but we did it just to find out he never turned them in!!!! He says he lost them!! So now he has to do them all over again and this time he is no where near willing!

Now I know a section 504 may help these problems but....... what are the draw backs?????? Does anyone have a section 504??? My worry is this.... It further labels my son. That colleges may look at this negatively when he completes high school. I want to get him the help he soooo desperately needs because these problems are causeing depression and lowering his self image but I don't want to brand him because he is so smart and if it wasn't for the ODD he would be more than excelling.

Please anyone who has dealt with this before help!!! I'm confused and only want to do whats best for my son without backlash.

thank you!!

marshawne - if you look at another post "ADD and too smart for 504 -help" on page 2 of the posts - someone posted the actual 504 plan law. Hope that helps.

First of all he is only in 7th grade right now. These next 2 school years are very important for your son's self esteem. That should be more important than worrying about whether he gets into college in more than 5 years from now. Colleges don't look at his middle school records and that is what needs to be focused on now. When he gets into highschool then you can worry about how the colleges will look at a student on is on a 504.

More than likely your son is refusing to do homework because is totally frustrated or mentally drained from being at school all day. It is very hard for a person with out AD/HD to understand this but sometimes the brains of people with AD/HD shut down because the are overwhelmed at the thought of having to do some which seems as simple as homework.

Your son really shouldn't be labled by a 504 (or an IEP fot that matter). A 504 smay be able to help him get his assignments in on time or give hom extra time to get them in. The main draw back of a 504 is that you as a parent must make sure the school system is actually following the 504.

Another thing that may also help is having your son work with an ADD coach. A coach can help him with ADD Friendly Strategies which can help get his homework done and in to the teachers.

Thank you for asking that question. I had never really thought about the weight colleges would put on a child with a 504 or IEP. I found the best place for IEP and 504 information is at www.wrightslaw.com or www.reedmartian.com. They are great links. Please let us know what you find out.