Need some legal representation in U.S. (education disability discrimination)

[biolizard89]

I suspect no one here will be able to help with this, but if anyone can recommend lawyers who might be willing to offer free or discounted legal representation to a very smart student in Oklahoma (I'm the student -- ACT 36, SAT 2310) who is being discriminated against by a very well-known scholarship provider due to disability (Americans with Disabilities Act and Sec. 504 of the Rehabilitation Act in the U.S.), please let me know.  Any lawyer willing to assist would be helping to produce new case law (different federal circuits disagree on the details of this, so the U.S. Supreme Court might get involved) which would, if successful, have a very beneficial effect for anti-discrimination efforts across the U.S.  I'm in the process of contacting ACLU; they're excellent, but they've suffered huge funding issues lately (and they have their hands full dealing with the government right now), so I'm not certain if ACLU will be able to take the case.  If anyone can help me out with this, thanks.  If no one here has recommendations, that's fine too, I know that's not the specialty of this forum (but that's why it's called the Off-Topic forum, right?).

Thanks,
-Biolizard89

[toonlink444]

Wish I could help man. I live in V.A and my dad is a lawyer but he helps docters.
Edit: Oh yeah I'm pretty sure you can ask anything on this forum but don't always expect an answer. I talk about stuff all the time here that has nothing to do with hacking.

[hetoan2]

care to explain the further details of your situation? I pretty much can't help at all, but your situation interests me :3

[biolizard89]

care to explain the further details of your situation? I pretty much can't help at all, but your situation interests me :3

Sure, I can elaborate.  (I'm not trying to keep details a secret, I just didn't want to drone on in my initial post.)

If you're in the U.S., you've probably heard of National Merit Scholarship Corp; they're the principal sponsor (along with College Board) of the PSAT and SAT standardized exams.  To receive a Natl. Merit scholarship, the main requirements are PSAT and SAT scores (along with GPA and a few other insignificant things).  The scholarship is worth $48,000 at the university I chose to attend.  The minimum PSAT and SAT scores to qualify vary from year to year but (in Oklahoma) are always near 208 and 2080 respectively.  My scores were 232 and 2310 respectively -- way above the cutoff.  Since my GPA in high school was 4.0 (unscaled), one would expect them to give me the scholarship.

Instead, they informed me that I was being disqualified under a rule that students must be "progressing normally" in high school -- which I assume is intended to weed out high school dropouts.  I most definitely did not drop out of high school, but I did take longer than 4 years to graduate, because I have a shortened schedule for medical reasons.  (I take multiple medically necessary medications which have the side effect of heavy sedation in the morning -- thus I cannot take morning classes.)  I had previously contacted National Merit about this so that they were aware of why I was taking longer to graduate, and they told me at the time that it was fine; I would simply have to re-qualify each year.  I did so, easily.  Unfortunately they did not provide this statement in writing.  Well, when when I was ready to advance from Semifinalist status (which I was in for the extra period where I had to re-qualify each year) to Finalist status (which I would have advanced to my final year of high school), they changed their mind and said that I was disqualified.  I informed them that as my extra time taken was due to medical disability, they were violating the Americans with Disabilities Act.  Their lawyer sent me a letter claiming that Natl. Merit was not subject to the ADA.  I believe this is incorrect and that they're simply hoping that I will choose to forego the scholarship rather than bring a lawsuit in federal court.  The issue is that the ADA covers "places of public accommodation" and "service establishments."  Natl. Merit appears to be claiming that since they provided me a service remotely (I didn't physically walk through their front door), they are not covered.  Different federal circuit courts disagree on this point; the Supreme Court has not ruled and neither has my federal circuit.  My take is that of course they're still covered.

College Board, which is the other corporation which manages the scholarship, receives federal funding, which makes them subject to the Rehabilitation Act, of which Sec. 504 essentially states that no recipient of federal funding may discriminate nor may they do business with anyone who discriminates.  College Board is most definitely covered by this, and since they do business (their test is what determines 98% of the scholarship selection process) with Natl. Merit, which discriminated, College Board is liable for that discrimination.  The case law here is more settled, but it still requires a lawsuit.

Unfortunately, bringing a lawsuit would cost more money than my family has available, and it would likely get appealed through the appeals court to the Supreme Court.  Hence, we're hoping a lawyer can assist with this for free or heavily discounted.  (If successful, case law would be formed which protects disables persons from discrimination remotely... this would be a valuable public service.)

Hope I explained that okay... if you're curious for more info you're welcome to ask.  (And sorry this is a long post....)

[Arudo]

This is probably the most interesting thing I've read all day.

[toonlink444]

This is probably the most interesting thing I've read all day.

Same good to know some facts and I hope your case improves.

[hetoan2]

honestly, the threat of a lawsuit alone will usually get them to reconsider their terms. all you need is a statement from a lawyer saying that they will, and they'll probably settle.