In the summer after middle school, George begged his mom to drive him to Lower Manhattan from their home in Brooklyn, so that he could walk around Stuyvesant High School, a massive 10-story building along the Hudson River.

He gazed up at it, trying to imagine what it would be like to go to one of New York City’s most prestigious institutions.

“I had this idea in my head of what Stuyvesant would be like,” he said, recalling that summer three years ago. “I’ve always been kind of a sucker for those big things.” (George and his mother requested pseudonyms for privacy reasons.)

George had attended gifted and talented programs, excelling in those environments, and seemingly was the type of student that Stuyvesent is built for. Yet students like him rarely attended.

George has a learning disability, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD. In middle school his individualized education program, or IEP, called for him to be in a classroom integrating students with and without disabilities co-taught by two teachers: one general education or subject specialist, and one special education teacher. He also received additional support, like guided notes and specialized counseling to help him stay organized and work on strategies to stay on task.

The accommodations he needed would greatly complicate his Stuyvesant dream.

At the city’s eight specialized high schools requiring an exam as the sole basis of admission, students classified with disabilities represent a staggeringly small share of the population, much lower than the average at high schools citywide. In fact, the specialized high schools rank close to the bottom or last, according to the Education Department data from the 2022-23 school year.

In some ways, this is by design: The specialized schools are the only high schools in the system not required to set seats aside for students with disabilities. Moreover, specialized high schools, directly and indirectly, have for decades discouraged students with learning disabilities from coming to their schools, according to advocates and parents as well as legal complaints filed on behalf of students. At some specialized high schools, students with disabilities barely eclipse 1% of the total population, Education Department data showed.

Read the full article about disability accommodations by Brendan Rose at Chalkbeat.