For anyone to suggest that it is somehow unfair for someone without a physical disability to receive ADA accommodation of extra time, you are mistaken and have a lot to learn about the world. You should know that there exist non-physical disabilities which can affect attention (even when reading a single question on the Prometric screen),reading comprehension, memory and the ability to store and interpret information in one's brain. This is not to be taken lightly. I scored a 96 on one of my exam sections with such accommodations as extra time. The extra time is to level the playing field. I still had to know the material. It didn't just happen because I took extra time for the math calculations. I knew the rules I'd studied in school and from my CPA review books really well, and I NEEDED the extra time to read the language on the screen and what the question was asking for, process it, retain it long enough so I wouldn't need to re-read it 10 times and go into a panic mode, and come up with the right answer based on what I'd learned over the past 5 years of my schooling.
To qualify for ADA accommodations on the CPA exam, you have to undergo a whole battery of tests with a licensed neuropsychologist that often takes 3-4 days to complete. My report requesting accommodations from the professional, including a full scale WAIS-III (Wescler Adult Intelligence Test, Woodcock Johnson) and complete battery of other tests, was about 15 typed pages long, which I had a signed copy of it mailed to the ADA coordinator for the UNIFORM cpa exam.
Also, the reason people think everyone claims to have ADD when most people don't have it is that there's a misconception that people with ADHD (I believe there are 3-4 types of ADHD (diagnosed based on a whole battery of testing) are people are simply lazy (and this is the reason they don't pay attention). This is idiotic. There is no ADD – I think the professionals all call it ADHD with a particular subtype now.
And there's also this idea that you can go to any doctor and have dextroamphetamine prescribed. This is simply not true. Yes, there are people who buy it off people illegally in schools and there might be a few doctors but not many. I was diagnosed with ADHD-impulsive subtype in addition to learning disabilities and anxiety disorder. I had many MDs willing to prescribe me dextroamphetamine (adderall) and I'd tried it once but do not use it because I found that it just made my heartbeat race and doesn't seem to help me settle down and concentrate.
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